Abstract: This paper presents a new two-stage weighted least squares (WLS) estimator for source localization using time differences of arrival (TDOA) measured by multiple moving receivers. The first stage transforms the highly nonlinear TDOA equations into a set of pseudo-linear ones by introducing intermediate variables and then uses the WLS estimator to obtain the initial estimation. The second stage refines the initial emitter location estimate obtained in the first stage by exploiting the relationship between the emitter position and the intermediate variables. The efficiency of the proposed algorithm is theoretically analyzed. Simulation shows the good performance of the proposed method.

Key words: passive location, multiple moving receivers, time difference of arrival, weighted least squares estimator