A Particle Marginal Metropolis-Hastings Multi-Target Tracker

Abstract

We propose a Bayesian multi-target batch processing algorithm capable of tracking an unknown number of targets that move close and/or cross each other in a dense clutter environment. The optimal Bayes multitarget tracking problem is formulated in the random finite set framework and a particle marginal Metropolis-Hastings (PMMH) technique which is a combination of the Metropolis-Hastings (MH) algorithm and sequential Monte Carlo methods is applied to compute the multi-target posterior distribution. The PMMH technique is used to design a high-dimensional proposal distributions for the MH algorithm and allows the proposed batch process multi-target tracker to handle a large number of tracks in a computationally feasible manner. Our simulations show that the proposed tracker reliably estimates the number of tracks and their trajectories in scenarios with a large number of closely spaced tracks in a dense clutter environment albeit, more expensive than online methods.