非差FCB估计及其在PPP模糊度固定中的应用

模糊度固定能够显著提高精密单点定位(PPP)的精度和收敛速度,是国内外卫星导航定位领域的研究热点．本文通过最小二乘法分离接收机端和卫星端小数周偏差(FCB),恢复非差模糊度的整数特性,将得到的卫星端FCB提供给用户,能够实现非差模糊度固定的PPP．采用全球IGS跟踪站的观测数据进行非差FCB解算,实验结果表明,宽巷FCB的稳定性较好,一周内变化小于0.1周,而窄巷FCB一天内变化较大．将获得的FCB用于模糊度固定PPP实验,E、N、U三个方向的定位精度分别为0.7 cm、0.8 cm和2.1 cm,与浮点解PPP相比,分别提高68％、51％和37％,验证了本文估计的FCB用于模糊度固定PPP的定位性能      

基于整数钟的PPP非差模糊度固定方法

非差模糊度固定能够有效提高精密单点定位(PPP)的定位精度和收敛速度,是国内外卫星导航定位领域的研究热点。基于整数钟实现了PPP非差模糊度固定,在非差模糊度逐级固定中分别估计接收机宽巷偏差和窄巷偏差;对宽巷和窄巷模糊度进行改正,从而消除了接收机硬件延迟对模糊度的影响;同时采用取整成功率检验和ratio值检验,保证模糊度固定的可靠性。将以上方法应用到动态精密单点定位中,实验结果表明:仿动态条件下,模糊度正确固定后,东、北向定位精度达到mm级、天向定位精度优于5 cm;动态解算条件下,采用1 s采样间隔数据16 min左右即可实现模糊度的首次固定。PPP固定解在东、北、天3个方向的定位精度分别为1.5、2.7和1.3 cm,相比于浮点解分别提升了61%、40%和38%。     

顾及星端多径改正的北斗观测网精密相对定位

给出了顾及星端多径(SIMP)改正的BDS精密相对定位非差观测模型,利用中国大陆构造环境监测网络多GNSS测站的BDS数据,采用网解的模式进行相对定位实验。结果表明,在SIMP改正之后,固定非GEO卫星之间的双差模糊度可显著提高定位精度。在N、E、U方向的7 d重复精度可分别达到3.0、3.3和10.2 mm;与不固定模糊度的结果相比分别提高了18.2%、30.8%和16.7%。特别注意到,在固定了宽巷模糊度之后,涉及GEO卫星的窄巷双差模糊度不具有整数特性。对这些双差模糊度进行固定将使定位精度显著降低。     

PPP网解UPD模糊度固定的无基站差分大型CORS站整网快速精密解算

本文利用“国家基准一期工程”和上千全国部分省市CORS站的GNSS观测资料,基于PPP网解UPD模糊度固定技术实现了区域内无基站差分毫米级定位以及上千全国CORS站整网一次快速精密解算,这对于保障国家应急测绘快速响应、实现灾区基准快速建立以及快速获取和恢复国家统一坐标框架基准站坐标等具有重要的实用价值意义。首先,选取2015年8月1—31日198个国家GNSS连续运行基准站计算卫星端的宽巷、窄巷UPD,采用PPP网解UPD模糊度固定技术,对这些GNSS测站的载波相位进行模糊度固定:宽巷模糊度31 d固定率平均值在80%以上的测站共有193个;窄巷模糊度31 d固定率平均值在60%以上的测站共有165个。其次,对PPP整网一次快速解算定位结果进行统计分析,结果表明:31 d整网解算在NEU 3个方向的RMS分别为2.8、3.9、5.3 mm;标准差分别为2.1、3.2、6.7 mm。再者,使用中国区域内5个IGS观测站进行无基站差分精密定位,与SOPAC单天解ITRF2008框架下历元坐标的对比分析表明,31 d单日解外符合精度水平及高程方向均相差在毫米量级。最后,利用上述GNSS基准站解算出来的卫星端的宽、窄巷UPD(31 d),依次对2015年8月1—31日全国及部分省市1195个CORS站观测数据进行载波相位模糊度固定,得到无模糊度的精确相位观测值,从而使法方程中待估模糊度参数减少,克服了基准站网规模和测站个数的限制,实现了上千CORS站整网一次快速解算,对31 d月平均解与国际知名软件GAMIT/GLOBK的双差月解结果(2015年国家基础测绘任务成果)进行比较,结果显示,NEU 3个方向上差异在1 cm以内的测站分别为99.92%、99.33%、79.83%,其中U方向相差在1.5 cm为93.22%。综上所述,PPP网解UPD模糊度固定技术的方法,确保了区域内无基站精密定位、大网快速解算的精度和效率,能够满足灾区及国家坐标框架基准站坐标快速解算与恢复的迫切需求。     

针对消电离层组合FCB的非组合PPP部分模糊度固定方法

非差模糊度经过未校准硬件延迟小数部分(fractional cycle bias,FCB)产品改正后恢复整周特性,能够显著缩短精密单点定位(precise point positioning,PPP)的初始化时间。服务端采用非组合模型估计FCB产品时,由于电离层误差的影响,原始频点L1和L2的FCB无法准确分离,因此提出一种基于消电离层组合FCB产品的非组合PPP部分模糊度固定方法。由于传统服务端消电离层组合FCB产品算法与用户端非组合模糊度固定算法具有一致性,可采用星间单差的宽巷和原始频点模糊度构建窄巷模糊度,利用消电离层组合FCB产品进行分步模糊度固定。采用全球120个MGEX(multi-GNSS experiment)测站作为服务端生成消电离层组合FCB和非组合FCB产品,再选取全球未参与服务端解算的10个测站进行评估验证。实验结果表明,相对于使用传统非组合FCB的模糊度固定方法,静态情况下,所提方法收敛精度平均提升25.0%,收敛时间缩短21.1%;仿动态条件下,所提方法收敛精度平均提升26.7%,收敛时间缩短17.9%。     

整数相位钟法精密单点定位模糊度固定模型及效果分析

精密单点定位(PPP)模糊度固定方法有3种:星间单差法、整数相位钟法和钟差解耦法,但目前仅法国CNES公开发布用于整数相位钟法PPP模糊度固定的产品,因此研究基于整数相位钟法的用户端PPP模糊度固定模型很有必要.本文分析了整数相位钟法PPP模糊度固定模型,着重指出该模型与传统浮点解PPP模型的区别;提出一种顾及质量控制的逐级模糊度固定策略用于具体实施PPP模糊度固定.大量动态PPP解算试验表明:与浮点解PPP相比,固定解PPP具有更快的收敛速度且定位精度和稳定性更好.     

BDS静态精密单点定位模糊度固定解精度分析

针对BDS单系统未校准相位延迟(UPD)估计以及不同时长精密单点定位(PPP)模糊度固定对定位精度影响的问题,该文选取56个测站估计UPD,利用未参与UPD计算的8个测站进行不同时长BDS静态PPP模糊度固定实验。结果表明:BDS星间单差宽巷和窄巷UPD在连续时段内具有一定的稳定性,其估计精度满足用于PPP模糊度固定要求。时长越短模糊度固定率越低。以IGS周解为参考值,不同时长模糊度固定解较浮点解三维定位精度均提高12%以上,时长越短模糊度固定解精度提高越显著。因此,模糊度固定是提高BDSPPP定位精度的重要手段。     

精密单点定位模糊度固定效果分析

利用区域GNSS参考网络进行宽巷及窄巷硬件延迟的估计,进而利用硬件延迟估计值对PPP模糊度进行固定。使用重庆CORS数据对该方法进行了实验分析。结果表明,宽巷及窄巷硬件延迟在一段时期内均比较稳定,宽巷及窄巷固定成功率分别达90%、85%左右。相对于浮点解,固定解精度在测站东方向上提高了30%左右。     

卫星端宽巷载波相位小数偏差估计方法研究与结果分析

提出了一种估计星间单差宽巷载波相位FCB的新方法——区间均化法。利用2010年全球约120个IGS测站的数据,估计出所有星间单差宽巷载波相位的FCB,详细比较分析了星间单差宽巷FCB的估计精度。结果表明,使用区间均化法获得的卫星宽巷载波相位的FCB与法国CNES中心发布的FCB产品具有很好的一致性,较差均小于0.1周,94%小于0.05周。不同测站数量和测站分布估计相同卫星组星间单差宽巷载波相位的FCB结果具有较好的一致性,但测站数越多,FCB估值的可靠性越高。绝大部分星间单差宽巷载波相位的FCB在1a内具有较好的稳定性,其时间序列的标准差小于0.01周。卫星工作状态的变化会使FCB重新赋值。     

一种整数相位钟法精密单点定位模糊度固定模型

星间单差法是常用的精密单点定位PPP模糊度固定方法,但是要面临基准星转换的问题。为此,提出了一种逐级模糊度固定模型,采用法国CNES发布的整数相位钟差产品,在PPP非差观测模型基础上逐一选取两颗卫星进行模糊度固定;得到多组单差模糊度固定解后,再以此构成约束条件进行滤波得到其他参数。实验选取了8个IGS站共48个观测时段进行模糊度固定实验。结果表明,模糊度成功固定后,位置三维误差平均值由5.60 cm减小到2.72 cm;位置误差标准差由3.64 cm减小到1.50 cm。仿动态条件下,模糊度固定后位置误差由6.02 cm降至4.75 cm。     

Rapid PPP ambiguity resolution using GPS+GLONASS observations

Integer ambiguity resolution (IAR) in precise point positioning (PPP) using GPS observations has been well studied. The main challenge remaining is that the first ambiguity fixing takes about 30 min. This paper presents improvements made using GPS+GLONASS observations, especially improvements in the initial fixing time and correct fixing rate compared with GPS-only solutions. As a result of the frequency division multiple access strategy of GLONASS, there are two obstacles to GLONASS PPP-IAR: first and most importantly, there is distinct code inter-frequency bias (IFB) between satellites, and second, simultaneously observed satellites have different wavelengths. To overcome the problem resulting from GLONASS code IFB, we used a network of homogeneous receivers for GLONASS wide-lane fractional cycle bias (FCB) estimation and wide-lane ambiguity resolution. The integer satellite clock of the GPS and GLONASS was then estimated with the wide-lane FCB products. The effect of the different wavelengths on FCB estimation and PPP-IAR is discussed in detail. We used a 21-day data set of 67 stations, where data from 26 stations were processed to generate satellite wide-lane FCBs and integer clocks and the other 41 stations were selected as users to perform PPP-IAR. We found that GLONASS FCB estimates are qualitatively similar to GPS FCB estimates. Generally, 98.8% of a posteriori residuals of wide-lane ambiguities are within \(\pm 0.25\) cycles for GPS, and 96.6% for GLONASS. Meanwhile, 94.5 and 94.4% of narrow-lane residuals are within 0.1 cycles for GPS and GLONASS, respectively. For a critical value of 2.0, the correct fixing rate for kinematic PPP is only 75.2% for GPS alone and as large as 98.8% for GPS+GLONASS. The fixing percentage for GPS alone is only 11.70 and 46.80% within 5 and 10 min, respectively, and improves to 73.71 and 95.83% when adding GLONASS. Adding GLONASS thus improves the fixing percentage significantly for a short time span. We also used global ionosphere maps (GIMs) to assist the wide-lane carrier-phase combination to directly fix the wide-lane ambiguity. Employing this method, the effect of the code IFB is eliminated and numerical results show that GLONASS FCB estimation can be performed across heterogeneous receivers. However, because of the relatively low accuracy of GIMs, the fixing percentage of GIM-aided GPS+GLONASS PPP ambiguity resolution is very low. We expect better GIM accuracy to enable rapid GPS+GLONASS PPP-IAR with heterogeneous receivers.     

GLONASS phase bias estimation and its PPP ambiguity resolution using homogeneous receivers

Integer ambiguity resolution (IAR) appreciably improves the position accuracy and shortens the convergence time of precise point positioning (PPP). However, while many studies are limited to GPS, there is a need to investigate the performance of GLONASS PPP ambiguity resolution. Unfortunately, because of the frequency-division multiple-access strategy of GLONASS, GLONASS PPP IAR faces two obstacles. First, simultaneously observed satellites operate at different wavelengths. Second and most importantly, distinct inter-frequency bias (IFB) exists between different satellites. For the former, we adopt an undifferenced method for uncalibrated phase delay (UPD) estimation and proposed an undifferenced PPP IAR strategy. We select a set of homogeneous receivers with identical receiver IFB to perform UPD estimation and PPP IAR. The code and carrier phase IFBs can be absorbed by satellite wide-lane and narrow-lane UPDs, respectively, which is in turn consistent with PPP IAR using the same type of receivers. In order to verify the method, we used 50 stations to generate satellite UPDs and another 12 stations selected as users to perform PPP IAR. We found that the GLONASS satellite UPDs are stable in time and space and can be estimated with high accuracy and reliability. After applying UPD correction, 91 % of wide-lane ambiguities and 99 % of narrow-lane ambiguities are within (?0.15, +0.15) cycles of the nearest integer. After ambiguity resolution, the 2-hour static PPP accuracy improves from (0.66, 1.42, 1.55) cm to (0.38, 0.39, 1.39) cm for the north, east, and up components, respectively.     

Assessment of PPP integer ambiguity resolution using GPS,GLONASS and BeiDou (IGSO,MEO) constellations

Although integer ambiguity resolution (IAR) can improve positioning accuracy considerably and shorten the convergence time of precise point positioning (PPP), it requires an initialization time of over 30 min. With the full operation of GLONASS globally and BDS in the Asia–Pacific region, it is necessary to assess the PPP–IAR performance by simultaneous fixing of GPS, GLONASS, and BDS ambiguities. This study proposed a GPS + GLONASS + BDS combined PPP–IAR strategy and processed PPP–IAR kinematically and statically using one week of data collected at 20 static stations. The undifferenced wide- and narrow-lane fractional cycle biases for GPS, GLONASS, and BDS were estimated using a regional network, and undifferenced PPP ambiguity resolution was performed to assess the contribution of multi-GNSSs. Generally, over 99% of a posteriori residuals of wide-lane ambiguities were within ±0.25 cycles for both GPS and BDS, while the value was 91.5% for GLONASS. Over 96% of narrow-lane residuals were within ±0.15 cycles for GPS, GLONASS, and BDS. For kinematic PPP with a 10-min observation time, only 16.2% of all cases could be fixed with GPS alone. However, adding GLONASS improved the percentage considerably to 75.9%, and it reached 90.0% when using GPS + GLONASS + BDS. Not all epochs could be fixed with a correct set of ambiguities; therefore, we defined the ratio of the number of epochs with correctly fixed ambiguities to the number of all fixed epochs as the correct fixing rate (CFR). Because partial ambiguity fixing was used, when more than five ambiguities were fixed correctly, we considered the epoch correctly fixed. For the small ratio criteria of 2.0, the CFR improved considerably from 51.7% for GPS alone, to 98.3% when using GPS + GLONASS + BDS combined solutions.     

Estimating satellite phase fractional cycle biases based on Kalman filter

Phase fractional cycle biases (FCBs) originating from satellites and receivers destroy the integer nature of PPP carrier phase ambiguities. To achieve integer ambiguity resolution of PPP, FCBs of satellites are required. In former work, least squares methods are commonly adopted to isolate FCBs from a network of reference stations. However, it can be extremely time consuming concerning the large number of observations from hundreds of stations and thousands of epochs. In addition, iterations are required to deal with the one-cycle inconsistency among FCB measurements. We propose to estimate the FCB based on a Kalman filter. The large number of observations are handled epoch by epoch, which significantly reduces the dimension of the involved matrix and accelerates the computation. In addition, it is also suitable for real-time applications. As for the one-cycle inconsistency, a pre-elimination method is developed to avoid iterations and posterior adjustments. A globally distributed network consisting of about 200 IGS stations is selected to determine the GPS satellite FCBs. Observations recorded from DoY 52 to 61 in 2016 are processed to verify the proposed approach. The RMS of wide lane (WL) posterior residuals is 0.09 cycles while that of the narrow lane (NL) is about 0.05 cycles, which indicates a good internal accuracy. The estimated WL FCBs also have a good consistency with existing WL FCB products (e.g., CNES-GRG, WHU-SGG). The RMS of differences with respect to GRG and SGG products are 0.03 and 0.05 cycles. For satellite NL FCB estimates, 97.9% of the differences with respect to SGG products are within ±?0.1 cycles. The RMS of the difference is 0.05 cycles. These results prove the efficiency of the proposed approach.     

Rapid re-convergences to ambiguity-fixed solutions in precise point positioning

Integer ambiguity resolution at a single receiver can be achieved if the fractional-cycle biases are separated from the ambiguity estimates in precise point positioning (PPP). Despite the improved positioning accuracy by such integer resolution, the convergence to an ambiguity-fixed solution normally requires a few tens of minutes. Even worse, these convergences can repeatedly occur on the occasion of loss of tracking locks for many satellites if an open sky-view is not constantly available, consequently totally destroying the practicability of real-time PPP. In this study, in case of such re-convergences, we develop a method in which ionospheric delays are precisely predicted to significantly accelerate the integer ambiguity resolution. The effectiveness of this method consists in two aspects: first, wide-lane ambiguities can be rapidly resolved using the ionosphere-corrected wide-lane measurements, instead of the noisy Melbourne–Wübbena combination measurements; second, narrow-lane ambiguity resolution can be accelerated under the tight constraints derived from the ionosphere-corrected unambiguous wide-lane measurements. In the test at 90 static stations suffering from simulated total loss of tracking locks, 93.3 and 95.0% of re-convergences to wide-lane and narrow-lane ambiguity resolutions can be achieved within five epochs of 1-Hz measurements, respectively, even though the time latency for the predicted ionospheric delays is up to 180 s. In the test at a mobile van moving in a GPS-adverse environment where satellite number significantly decreases and cycle slips frequently occur, only when the predicted ionospheric delays are applied can the rate of ambiguity-fixed epochs be dramatically improved from 7.7 to 93.6% of all epochs. Therefore, this method can potentially relieve the unrealistic requirement of a continuous open sky-view by most PPP applications and improve the practicability of real-time PPP.     

Assessment of correct fixing rate for precise point positioning ambiguity resolution on a global scale

Ambiguity resolution (AR) for a single receiver has been a popular topic in Global Positioning System (GPS) recently. Ambiguity-resolution methods for precise point positioning (PPP) have been well documented in recent years, demonstrating that it can improve the accuracy of PPP. However, users are often concerned about the reliability of ambiguity-fixed PPP solution in practical applications. If ambiguities are fixed to wrong integers, large errors would be introduced into position estimates. In this paper, we aim to assess the correct fixing rate (CFR), i.e., number of ambiguities correctly fixing to the total number of ambiguities correctly and incorrectly fixing, for PPP user ambiguity resolution on a global scale. A practical procedure is presented to evaluate the CFR of PPP user ambiguity resolution. GPS data of the first 3 days in each month of 2010 from about 390 IGS stations are used for experiments. Firstly, we use GPS data collected from about 320 IGS stations to estimate global single-differenced (SD) wide-lane and narrow-lane satellite uncalibrated phase delays (UPDs). The quality of UPDs is evaluated. We found that wide-lane UPD estimates have a rather small standard deviation (Std) between 0.003 and 0.004 cycles while most of Std of narrow-lane estimates are from 0.01 to 0.02 cycles. Secondly, many experiments have been conducted to investigate the CFR of integer ambiguity resolution we can achieve under different conditions, including reference station density, observation session length and the ionospheric activity. The results show that the CFR of PPP can exceed 98.0 % with only 1 h of observations for most user stations. No obvious correlation between the CFR and the reference station density is found. Therefore, nearly homogeneous CFR can be achieved in PPP AR for global users. At user end, higher CFR could be achieved with longer observations. The average CFR for 30-min, 1-h, 2-h and 4-h observation is 92.3, 98.2, 99.5 and 99.7 %, respectively. In order to get acceptable CFR, 1 h is a recommended minimum observation time. Furthermore, the CFR of PPP can be affected by diurnal variation and geomagnetic latitude variation in the ionosphere. During one day at the hours when rapid ionospheric variations occur or in low geomagnetic latitude regions where equatorial electron density irregularities are produced relatively frequently, a significant degradation of the CFR is demonstrated.     

Generating GPS satellite fractional cycle bias for ambiguity-fixed precise point positioning

With the development of precise point positioning (PPP), the School of Geodesy and Geomatics (SGG) at Wuhan University is now routinely producing GPS satellite fractional cycle bias (FCB) products with open access for worldwide PPP users to conduct ambiguity-fixed PPP solution. We provide a brief theoretical background of PPP and present the strategies and models to compute the FCB products. The practical realization of the two-step (wide-lane and narrow-lane) FCB estimation scheme is described in detail. With GPS measurements taken in various situations, i.e., static, dynamic, and on low earth orbit (LEO) satellites, the quality of FCB estimation and the effectiveness of PPP ambiguity resolution (AR) are evaluated. The comparison with CNES FCBs indicated that our FCBs had a good consistency with the CNES ones. For wide-lane FCB, almost all the differences of the two products were within ±0.05 cycles. For narrow-lane FCB, 87.8 % of the differences were located between ±0.05 cycles, and 97.4 % of them were located between ±0.075 cycles. The experimental results showed that, compared with conventional ambiguity-float PPP, the averaged position RMS of static PPP can be improved from (3.6, 1.4, 3.6) to (2.0, 1.0, 2.7) centimeters for ambiguity-fixed PPP. The average accuracy improvement in the east, north, and up components reached 44.4, 28.6, and 25.0 %, respectively. A kinematic, ambiguity-fixed PPP test with observation of 80 min achieved a position accuracy of better than 5 cm at the one-sigma level in all three coordinate components. Compared with the results of ambiguity-float, kinematic PPP, the positioning biases of ambiguity-fixed PPP were improved by about 78.2, 20.8, and 65.1 % in east, north, and up. The RMS of LEO PPP test was improved by about 23.0, 37.0, and 43.0 % for GRACE-A and GRACE-B in radial, tangential, and normal directions when AR was applied to the same data set. These results demonstrated that the SGG FCB products can be produced with high quality for users anywhere around the world to carry out ambiguity-fixed PPP solutions.     

窄巷FCB估计方法改进及时变特性分析

窄巷波长相对较短,受观测数据质量和未模型化误差的影响较大,导致参考站计算的窄巷FCB估值的互差较大,窄巷FCB稳定性较差。针对窄巷FCB估值出现较大偏差的参考站,本文提出了基于抗差初值的窄巷FCB抗差估计方法,该方法取当前历元所有参考站窄巷FCB估值的中位数作为抗差初值,采用IGGⅢ方案降低了有偏差的窄巷FCB估值的权比。采用IGS全球跟踪站网的数据进行验证,改进的方法提高了窄巷FCB的精度和稳定性,采用每天估计的一组卫星端的窄巷FCB即可满足窄巷模糊度固定的精度要求。同时,采用本文改进方法估计的窄巷FCB,可以提高用户端仿动态单天解的窄巷模糊度固定成功率和定位精度。     

Resolution of GPS carrier-phase ambiguities in Precise Point Positioning (PPP) with daily observations

Precise Point Positioning (PPP) has been demonstrated to be a powerful tool in geodetic and geodynamic applications. Although its accuracy is almost comparable with network solutions, the east component of the PPP results is still to be improved by integer ambiguity fixing, which is, up to now, prevented by the presence of the uncalibrated phase delays (UPD) originating in the receivers and satellites. In this paper, it is shown that UPDs are rather stable in time and space, and can be estimated with high accuracy and reliability through a statistical analysis of the ambiguities estimated from a reference network. An approach is implemented to estimate the fractional parts of the single-difference (SD) UPDs between satellites in wide- and narrow-lane from a global reference network. By applying the obtained SD-UPDs as corrections to the SD-ambiguities at a single station, the corrected SD-ambiguities have a naturally integer feature and can therefore be fixed to integer values as usually done for the double-difference ones in the network mode. With data collected at 450 stations of the International GNSS Service (IGS) through days 106 to 119 in 2006, the efficiency of the presented ambiguity-fixing strategy is validated using IGS Final products. On average, more than 80% of the independent ambiguities could be fixed reliably, which leads to an improvement of about 27% in the repeatability and 30% in the agreement with the IGS weekly solutions for the east component of station coordinates, compared with the real-valued solutions. An erratum to this article can be found at