Performance Evaluation & Analysis of Direction of Arrival Estimation Algorithms using ULA

In Array signal processing field, the problem of finding the direction of signal sources at the receiving antenna is one of the most important and challenging tasks in many of the applications such as radar, wireless communications, sonar, radio astronomy and navigation. Direction of Arrival (DOA) estimation can be achieved by the antenna array at the receiver side. The resolution of a DOA estimation algorithm depends on the antenna array structures and these algorithms also have the capability to identify the number of signal sources and their directions (multiple signal sources). This paper presents the simulation and performance comparison of all the low and high-resolution DOA estimation algorithms namely Beamforming, Capon/MVDR, MUSIC, Improved-MUSIC, Root-MUSIC and ESPRIT. These algorithms are simulated and investigated using Uniform Linear Array (ULA) in presence of White noise and interference noise. The simulation results shown in this paper investigates that the performance of any DOA estimation algorithm depends on features such as number of array elements, number of signal sources, correlation between the signal sources, Signal-to-noise ratio, array element spacing, number of snapshots and the angle separation between adjacent signal sources.