Multi-Target Acquisition in Multistatic MIMO-OFDM Joint Sensing and Communication

Abstract: In this work, we investigate a multistatic MIMO-OFDM joint sensing and communication (JSC) system that leverages cooperation among spatially distributed base stations (BSs) to detect and localize multiple targets through soft fusion of range-angle maps. We propose an innovative selective data fusion strategy that combines only the most reliable regions of range-angle maps from each bistatic pair, mitigating the adverse effects of residual clutter and target smearing inherent to bistatic configurations. To further enhance multi-view perception, we introduce a round-robin transmitter role strategy, enabling BSs to cooperate and exploit target spatial diversity. Finally, we assess the system performance in a cluttered environment using the generalized optimal subpattern assignment (GOSPA) and root mean squared error (RMSE) metrics, demonstrating the effectiveness of our approaches in improving detection and localization.