Abstract
In this paper, we consider a problem of partitioning a search area into smaller rectangular regions, so that multiple platforms can conduct search operations independently without requiring unnecessary coordination among themselves. The search area consists of cells where each cell has some prior information regarding the probability of target existence. The detection probability in particular cell is evaluated by multiplying the observation probability of the platform and the target existence probability in that cell. The total detection probability within the search area is defined as the cumulative detection probability for each cell. However, since this search area partitioning problem is NP-Hard, we decompose the problem into three sequential phases to solve this computationally intractable problem. Additionally, we discuss a special case of this problem, which can provide an optimal analytic solution. We also examine the performance of the proposed approach by comparing our results with the optimal analytic solution.