ICAR, a tool for Blind Source Separation using Fourth Order Statistics only

International audienceThe problem of blind separation of overdetermined mixtures of sources, that is, with fewer sources than (or as many sources as) sensors, is addressed in this paper. A new method, named ICAR (Independent Component Analysis using Redundancies in the quadricovariance), is proposed in order to process complex data. This method, without any whitening operation, only exploits some redundancies of a particular quadricovariance matrix of the data. Computer simulations demonstrate that ICAR offers in general good results and even outperforms classical methods in several situations: ICAR ~(i) succeeds in separating sources with low signal to noise ratios, ~(ii) does not require sources with different SO or/and FO spectral densities, ~(iii) is asymptotically not affected by the presence of a Gaussian noise with unknown spatial correlation, (iv) is not sensitive to an over estimation of the number of sources

Underdetermined blind separation by combining sparsity and independence of sources

In this paper, we address underdetermined blind separation of N sources from their M instantaneous mixtures, where N>M , by combining the sparsity and independence of sources. First, we propose an effective scheme to search some sample segments with the local sparsity, which means that in these sample segments, only Q(Q < M) sources are active. By grouping these sample segments into different sets such that each set has the same Q active sources, the original underdetermined BSS problem can be transformed into a series of locally overdetermined BSS problems. Thus, the blind channel identification task can be achieved by solving these overdetermined problems in each set by exploiting the independence of sources. In the second stage, we will achieve source recovery by exploiting a mild sparsity constraint, which is proven to be a sufficient and necessary condition to guarantee recovery of source signals. Compared with some sparsity-based UBSS approaches, this paper relaxes the sparsity restriction about sources to some extent by assuming that different source signals are mutually independent. At the same time, the proposed UBSS approach does not impose any richness constraint on sources. Theoretical analysis and simulation results illustrate the effectiveness of our approach

Separation of MECG and FECG using CCA-EMD Process

Under-determined blind source separation aims to separate N non-stationary sources from M (

ICAR, un algorithme d'ICA à convergence rapide, robuste au bruit

- Une nouvelle méthode de séparation aveugle de sources, baptisée ICAR et n'exploitant que les statistiques d'ordre 4 des observations, est proposée. Cette dernière est comparée par simulations aux méthodes usuelles, COM1, COM2, JADE et FastICA. Sa vitesse de convergence et sa robustesse à la cohérence spatiale (inconnue du récepteur) d'un bruit gaussien font d'ICAR l'un des algorithmes les plus performants à l'heure actuelle

Cram\'er-Rao Bounds for Complex-Valued Independent Component Extraction: Determined and Piecewise Determined Mixing Models

This paper presents Cram\'er-Rao Lower Bound (CRLB) for the complex-valued Blind Source Extraction (BSE) problem based on the assumption that the target signal is independent of the other signals. Two instantaneous mixing models are considered. First, we consider the standard determined mixing model used in Independent Component Analysis (ICA) where the mixing matrix is square and non-singular and the number of the latent sources is the same as that of the observed signals. The CRLB for Independent Component Extraction (ICE) where the mixing matrix is re-parameterized in order to extract only one independent target source is computed. The target source is assumed to be non-Gaussian or non-circular Gaussian while the other signals (background) are circular Gaussian or non-Gaussian. The results confirm some previous observations known for the real domain and bring new results for the complex domain. Also, the CRLB for ICE is shown to coincide with that for ICA when the non-Gaussianity of background is taken into account. %unless the assumed sources' distributions are misspecified. Second, we extend the CRLB analysis to piecewise determined mixing models. Here, the observed signals are assumed to obey the determined mixing model within short blocks where the mixing matrices can be varying from block to block. However, either the mixing vector or the separating vector corresponding to the target source is assumed to be constant across the blocks. The CRLBs for the parameters of these models bring new performance bounds for the BSE problem.Comment: 25 pages, 8 figure

Symmetric Tensor Decomposition by an Iterative Eigendecomposition Algorithm

We present an iterative algorithm, called the symmetric tensor eigen-rank-one iterative decomposition (STEROID), for decomposing a symmetric tensor into a real linear combination of symmetric rank-1 unit-norm outer factors using only eigendecompositions and least-squares fitting. Originally designed for a symmetric tensor with an order being a power of two, STEROID is shown to be applicable to any order through an innovative tensor embedding technique. Numerical examples demonstrate the high efficiency and accuracy of the proposed scheme even for large scale problems. Furthermore, we show how STEROID readily solves a problem in nonlinear block-structured system identification and nonlinear state-space identification

Analyse en Composantes Indépendantes Multidimensionnelles via des cumulants d’ordres variés

The author deals with the problem of multidimensional independent component analysis (MICA) which is the natural generalization of the ordinary problem of independent component analysis (ICA). First, in order to facilitate the use of higher-order cumulants, we present new formulas for the cumulant matrices of a real random vector from its moment matrices. In addition to the usual matrix operations, these formulas use only the Kronecker product, the vec operator and some commutation matrices. These formulas lend themselves to examine more closely the specific structures of cumulant matrices and provide results on the ranks of these matrices that characterize the dependence between random variables composing the random vector. The main practical interest of our matrix formulas lies in much easier cumulant evaluation and faster computation than the conventional method based on repeated use of the Leonov and Shiryaev formulas. In the second part of this thesis, we show that under the usual assumptions of the independent multidimensional component analysis, contracted cumulant matrices at any statistical order are all block diagonalizable in the same basis. We derive an algorithm for solving MICA by block diagonalization and compare the results obtained to the orders 3-6, between them and with other methods, on several synthetic signals. Simple examples are developed to justify the need to combine different levels to ensure the best separation. We also prove that the easiest case to deal with is the case of mixtures of sources that have different dimensions. In the last part of this thesis we propose a set of methods that operate only the higher- order statistics. Under certain additional assumptions, these methods are shown to completely solve the noisy MICA problem without second-order whitening by joint block diagonalization of a cumulant matrices set coming from statistics of orders strictly higher than four. A comparison with the second-order based whitening MICA methods for the separation of fetal and maternal electrical activities (measured using three electrodes placed on the mother’s abdomen) shows that this new family is better suited to this application : it allow an almost perfect separation of these two contributions.L’auteur s’intéresse au problème de l’analyse en composantes indépendantes multidimensionnelles (ACIM) qui est la généralisation naturelle du problème ordinaire de l’analyse en composantes indépendantes (ACI). Tout d’abord, afin de faciliter l’utilisation des cumulants des ordres supérieurs, nous présentons de nou- velles formules pour le calcul matriciel des matrices de cumulants d’un vecteur aléatoire réel à partir de ses matrices de moments. Outre les opérations matricielles usuelles, ces formules utilisent uniquement le produit de Kronecker, l’opérateur vec et des matrices de commutation. Nous pouvons immédiatement à partir de ces formules examiner de plus près les structures particulières des matrices de cumulants et ainsi donner des résultats sur les rangs de ces matrices qui caractérisent la dépendance entre les variables aléatoires constituant le vecteur aléatoire. L’intérêt pratique principal de nos formules matricielles réside certainement dans une évaluation des cumulants beaucoup plus aisée et rapide qu’avec la méthode usuelle basée sur une utilisation répétée des formules de Leonov et Shiryaev. Dans la deuxième partie de cette thèse, nous montrons que sous les hypothèses usuelles de l’analyse en composantes indépendantes mul- tidimensionnelles, les matrices de cumulants contractées à un ordre statistique quelconque sont toutes bloc-diagonalisables dans la même base. Nous en déduisons des algorithmes de résolution d’ACIM par bloc-diagonalisation conjointe et comparons les résultats obtenus aux ordres 3 à 6, entre eux et avec d’autres méthodes, sur quelques signaux synthétiques. Des exemples simples ont élaborés afin de justifier la nécessité de combiner des ordres différents pour garantir la meilleure séparation. Nous prouvons aussi que le cas le plus simple à traiter est celui de mélanges de sources qui ont différentes dimensions. Dans la dernière partie de cette thèse nous proposons une famille de méthodes qui exploitent uniquement les sta- tistiques d’ordres supérieurs à deux. Sous certaines hypothèses supplémentaires, ces méthodes permettent après un blanchiment d’ordre quatre des observations de résoudre complètement le problème ACIM bruité en bloc diagonalisant conjointement un ensemble de matrices de cumulants issues des statistiques d’ordres supérieurs strictement à quatre. Une comparaison avec les méthodes ACIM à blanchiment d’ordre deux pour la séparation des activités électriques foetale et maternelle (mesurées via trois électrodes placées sur l’abdomen de la mère) montre que cette nouvelle famille est mieux adaptée à cette application : elles permettent une séparation quasi parfaite de ces deux contributions

Blind identification of possibly under-determined convolutive MIMO systems

Blind identi¯cation of a Linear Time Invariant (LTI) Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (MIMO) system is of great importance in many applications, such as speech processing, multi-access communication, multi-sensor sonar/radar systems, and biomedical applications. The objective of blind identi¯cation for a MIMO system is to identify an unknown system, driven by Ni unobservable inputs, based on the No system outputs. We ¯rst present a novel blind approach for the identi¯cation of a over-determined (No ¸ Ni) MIMO system driven by white, mutually independent unobservable inputs. Samples of the system frequency response are obtained based on Parallel Factorization (PARAFAC) of three- or four-way tensors constructed respectively based on third- or fourth-order cross-spectra of the system outputs. We show that the information available in the higher-order spectra allows for the system response to be identi¯ed up to a constant scaling and permutation ambiguities and a linear phase ambiguity. Important features of the proposed approaches are that they do not require channel length information, need no phase unwrapping, and unlike the majority of existing methods, need no pre-whitening of the system outputs.While several methods have been proposed to blindly identify over-determined convolutive MIMO systems, very scarce results exist for under-determined (No < Ni) case, all of which refer to systems that either have some special structure, or special No, Ni values. We propose a novel approach for blind identi¯cation of under-determined convolutive MIMO systems of general dimensions. As long as min(No;Ni) ¸ 2, we can always ¯nd the appropriate order of statistics that guarantees identi¯ability of the system response within trivial ambiguities. We provide the description of the class of identi¯able MIMO systems for a certain order of statistics K, and an algorithm to reach the solution.Finally we propose a novel approach for blind identi¯cation and symbol recovery of a distributed antenna system with multiple carrier-frequency o®sets (CFO), arising due to mismatch between the oscillators of transmitters and receivers. The received base-band signal is over-sampled, and its polyphase components are used to formulate a virtual MIMO problem. By applying blind MIMO system estimation techniques, the system response is estimated and used to subsequently decouple the users and transform the multiple CFOs estimation problem into a set of independent single CFO estimation problems.Ph.D., Electrical Engineering -- Drexel University, 200

Array processing based on time-frequency analysis and higher-order statistics

Ph.DDOCTOR OF PHILOSOPH