Maximum posterior estimation and performance analysis of range in signal-target radar detection system

In the absence of <i>a priori</i> information, maximum likelihood estimation (MLE) of parameter is considered to be the optimal estimation. But if <i>a priori</i> information is already known to us, then maximum posterior estimation (MAP) of the parameter can be obtained. This paper proposes maximum posterior estimation (MAP) of the target range in single-target radar detection systems and then evaluate its estimation performance. In addition, entropy error (EE) is also proposed as new evaluation indicator of estimation performance which is applied to the evaluation of MAP and MLE in the paper together with mean square error (MSE) based on information theory. Numerical simulation result shows that the estimation performance of MAP is better than that of MLE under two kinds of evaluation indicators. The consistence of the results about performance of two estimation methods also reflects rationality of EE as metrics to estimation performance.