Raytheon Company

Julie R Schacht

John E Albus

Lloyd J Lewins

Gillian K Groves

Grace Y Chen

A system and method for detecting breaklock for correlation trackers. The inventive system includes a first circuit () for computing energy Ein a residual image, a second circuit () for computing energy Ein an input image, and a third circuit () for computing a residual metric Rbased on the residual image energy Escaled by the input image energy E. In the illustrative embodiment, the system further includes a fourth circuit () for comparing the residual metric Rto a threshold T, and a fifth circuit () for setting a breaklock signal based on the output of the fourth circuit ().

Correlation tracker breaklock detection

In accordance with one aspect of the present invention, a system for tracking a target is provided that includes an image sensor mounted to a gimbal for acquiring an image, wherein the image includes a plurality of pixels representing the target and a background. The system further includes a motor for rotating the gimbal and an autotracker electrically coupled to the image sensor and the motor. The autotracker includes a probability map generator for computing a probability that each of the plurality of pixels having a particular intensity is either a portion of the target or a portion of the background, a pixel processor in communicative relation with the probability map generator for calculating a centroid of the target based upon the probabilities computed by the probability map generator, and a controller in communicative relation with the pixel processor for generating commands to the motor based upon the centroid.

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Torrance, CA, United States of America

Julie R Schacht