Instantaneous BDS + GPS undifferenced NRTK positioning with dynamic atmospheric constraints

As the Chinese BeiDou Navigation Satellite System (BDS) has become operational in the Asia-Pacific region, it is important to better understand and demonstrate the benefits of combining triple-frequency BDS with dual-frequency GPS observations for network-based real-time kinematic (NRTK) services. Undifferenced NRTK is a new NRTK service mode, it extends the concept of NRTK by not requiring reference station and specified reference satellite at the rover processing. In order to realize the undifferenced NRTK service, a strategy for real-time modeling the undifferenced (UD) augmentation information is given, in which the fixed double-differenced ambiguities are transformed into UD ones with the help of datum settings. Since this strategy is insensitive to existing ephemeris products, it is applicable to the services of current BDS regional reference networks. Furthermore, a processing scheme for ambiguity resolution (AR) with arbitrary-frequency observations is also presented in detail. An instantaneous and reliable BDS + GPS positioning service can be provided to the rovers in undifferenced NRTK processing mode. With the data collected at 31 stations from a continuously operating reference station network in Guangdong Province (GDCORS) of China, the efficiency of the proposed approaches using combined BDS and GPS observations is confirmed. For three rover stations during days 327–329, a total of 12,960 1-min tests were performed separately to demonstrate the performance of AR. Thanks to the dynamically refined priori information of residual tropospheric and ionospheric error, and the availability of more satellites and observations, the AR fixing rates of combined BDS and GPS systems improve by 13 to 65%, compared with those of the GPS-only system using the traditional WL-L1-IF scheme. The positioning accuracy has also significantly improved.     

An experimental performance analysis of real-time kinematic positioning with NASA’s Internet-Based Global Differential GPS

The Global Differential GPS (GDGPS) system developed by JPL aims at seamless global real-time positioning at the dm accuracy level for dual-frequency receivers either fixed or mobile, anywhere and at any time. The GDGPS system relies on GPS data transmitted in real-time to a central processing center at JPL from a global network of permanently operating GPS dual-frequency receivers. At the processing center, the Internet-based Global Differential GPS (IGDG) system, the heart of JPLs GDGPS, generates and disseminates over the open Internet special 1-s global differential corrections (IGDG corrections) to the GPS broadcast ephemerides. The IGDG corrections enhance the accuracy of GPS broadcast orbits and clocks down to the dm level and serve as the key-factor for high-precise real-time positioning of a stand-alone receiver. An experimental verification of the dm positional accuracy of the IGDG system was carried out in the Netherlands, by means of both a static and a kinematic test. During the static test GPS data were collected for 5 consecutive days using a fixed immobile receiver and processed as if in real-time. Within the framework of the kinematic test, an experiment was carried out using a kinematic platform. Our tests confirmed the dm accuracy of stand-alone receiver positioning with IGDG. The standard deviation for positioning both in static and kinematic mode appears to be 10 cm in each horizontal component and 20 cm in the vertical component. More than 99% of the IGDG corrections were received with the expected 1-s interval in the field via mobile communication, the latency of the corrections was generally from 7 to 8 s.     

Reduced dynamic and kinematic precise orbit determination for the Swarm mission from 4 years of GPS tracking

Precise science orbits for the first 4 years of the Swarm mission have been generated from onboard GPS measurements in a systematic reprocessing using refined models and processing techniques. Key enhancements relate to the introduction of macro-models for a more elaborate non-gravitational force modeling (solar radiation pressure, atmospheric drag and lift, earth albedo), as well as carrier phase ambiguity fixing. Validation using satellite laser ranging demonstrates a 30% improvement in the precision of the reduced dynamic orbits with resulting errors at the 0.5–1 cm level (1D RMS). A notable performance improvement is likewise achieved for the kinematic orbits, which benefit most from the ambiguity fixing and show a 50% error reduction in terms of SLR residuals while differences with respect to reduced dynamic ephemerides amount to only 1.7 cm (median of daily 3D RMS). Compared to the past kinematic science orbits based on float-ambiguity estimates, the new kinematic position solutions exhibit a factor of reduction of two to three in Allan deviation at time scales of 1000s and higher, and promise an improved recovery of low-degree and -order gravity field coefficients in Swarm gravity field analyses.     

A cycle slip fixing method with GPS + GLONASS observations in real-time kinematic PPP

A key limitation of precise point positioning (PPP) is the long convergence time, which requires about 30 min under normal conditions. Frequent cycle slips or data gaps in real-time operation force repeated re-convergence. Repairing cycle slips with GPS data alone in severely blocked environments is difficult. Adding GLONASS data can supply redundant observations, but adds the difficulty of having to deal with differing wavelengths. We propose a single-difference between epoch (SDBE) method to integrate GPS and GLONASS for cycle slip fixing. The inter-system bias can be eliminated by SDBE, thus only one receiver clock parameter is needed for both systems. The inter-frequency bias of GLONASS satellites also cancels in the SDBE, so cycle slips are preserved as integers, and the LAMBDA method is adopted to search for cycle slips. Data from 7 days of 20 globally distributed IGS sites were selected to test the proposed cycle slip fixing procedure with artificial blocking of the signal; cycle slips were introduced for all un-blocked satellites at each epoch. For a 30-s sampling interval, the average success rate of fixing can be improved from 73 to 98 % by adding GLONASS. Even for a 180-s sampling interval, GPS + GLONASS can achieve a success rate of 81 %. A real-time kinematic PPP experiment was also performed, and the results show that using GPS + GLONASS can achieve continuous high-accuracy real-time PPP without re-convergence.     

High-rate GPS clock corrections from CODE: support of 1 Hz applications

GPS zero-difference applications with a sampling rate up to 1 Hz require corresponding high-rate GPS clock corrections. The determination of the clock corrections in a full network solution is a time-consuming task. The Center for Orbit Determination in Europe (CODE) has developed an efficient algorithm based on epoch-differenced phase observations, which allows to generate high-rate clock corrections within reasonably short time (< 2 h) and with sufficient accuracy (on the same level as the CODE rapid or final clock corrections, respectively). The clock determination procedure at CODE and the new algorithm is described in detail. It is shown that the simplifications to speed up the processing are not causing a significant loss of accuracy for the clock corrections. The high-rate clock corrections have in essence the same quality as clock corrections determined in a full network solution. In order to support 1 Hz applications 1-s clock corrections would be needed. The computation time, even for the efficient algorithm, is not negligible, however. Therefore, we studied whether a reduced sampling is sufficient for the GPS satellite clock corrections to reach the same or only slightly inferior level of accuracy as for the full 1-s clock correction set. We show that high-rate satellite clock corrections with a spacing of 5 s may be linearly interpolated resulting in less than 2% degradation of accuracy.     

From GPS and GLONASS via EGNOS to Galileo – Positioning and Navigation in the Third Millennium

Positioning and navigation – as are presently possible with the American Global Positioning System (GPS) and the Russian GLONASS system – is briefly reviewed. Deficiencies, which have led to augmentations like the European Geostationary Navigation Overlay System (EGNOS), are outlined. Europe's decision to get involved in the definition and possible set-up of a Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) of the second generation (GNSS-2), called Galileo, is discussed in detail as well as the GPS modernization program that might take place during the sample phase. Finally, some brief thoughts on the benefit of GNSS-2 for geodesy and surveying are given. ? 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

Ellipsoidal corrections to order e 2 of geopotential coefficients and Stokes’ formula

Assuming that the gravity anomaly and disturbing potential are given on a reference ellipsoid, the result of Sjöberg (1988, Bull Geod 62:93–101) is applied to derive the potential coefficients on the bounding sphere of the ellipsoid to order e ² (i.e. the square of the eccentricity of the ellipsoid). By adding the potential coefficients and continuing the potential downward to the reference ellipsoid, the spherical Stokes formula and its ellipsoidal correction are obtained. The correction is presented in terms of an integral over the unit sphere with the spherical approximation of geoidal height as the argument and only three well-known kernel functions, namely those of Stokes, Vening-Meinesz and the inverse Stokes, lending the correction to practical computations. Finally, the ellipsoidal correction is presented also in terms of spherical harmonic functions. The frequently applied and sometimes questioned approximation of the constant m, a convenient abbreviation in normal gravity field representations, by e ²/2, as introduced by Moritz, is also discussed. It is concluded that this approximation does not significantly affect the ellipsoidal corrections to potential coefficients and Stokes formula. However, whether this standard approach to correct the gravity anomaly agrees with the pure ellipsoidal solution to Stokes formula is still an open question.     

Quality aspects of a GPS reference network in Antarctica – a simulation study

GPS has become an essential tool for the precise determination of point positions. Since GPS campaigns for geodynamic purposes – such as the monitoring of recent crustal movements – require major financial efforts, it is essential to ensure already in the planning phase a good network quality and the attainment of the scientific goals in a reasonable time. The paper outlines an operationally oriented procedure for these purposes based on the simulation and processing of GPS carrier-phase observations. Sensitivity analysis techniques are applied to describe both the network strain as it may be induced by gross errors and the detectability of point movements between two sessions or two campaigns. In addition, the eigenvalue decomposition of the variance-covariance matrix of the GPS coordinates will be used to identify weakly determined network components. The design of the SCAR Epoch 95 Campaign GPS network is discussed throughout the paper. It was realized in the Antarctic summer 1994/1995 on the Antarctic peninsula. Received: 30 November 1995 / Accepted: 1 July 1997     

Improvement of GPS/acoustic seafloor positioning precision through controlling the ship’s track line

The precision of GPS/acoustic seafloor positioning was improved by introducing a hull-mounted onboard system in March 2008, which allows us to conduct acoustic ranging measurements with the vessel sailing along the pre-determined track lines, while the early system before 2008 could only adopt the uncontrollable drifting observation. The continuity of the positioning results due to the transition was first confirmed through the comparison between results from sailing and drifting observations conducted in parallel. Using the data acquired for about 3 years since 2008, the repeatability of the determined position for the sailing observation was evaluated to be about 2 cm in root mean squares in the horizontal component, significantly better than that for the early drifting observation. The improvement of positioning precision probably resulted from the improvement of geometric distribution of acoustic ranging data by controlling the track lines. It was also shown that the sailing observation allows to obtain reliable results with a smaller amount of data. Comparison between the results in different sea regions suggests that positioning precision is better in the region along the Nankai Trough than in the region along the Japan Trench, probably because of the complicated acoustic velocity structure of seawater often observed in the latter. Furthermore, the precision of height determination was also improved, which leads us to expect that vertical crustal movement will be detectable in the future through accumulation of data as well as further technology development.     

Analyses and Solutions of Errors on GPS／GLONASS Positioning

This paper focuses mainly on the major errors and their reduction approaches pertaining to combined GPS/GLONASS positioning.To determine thd difference in the time reference systems,different receiver clock offsets are introduced with respect to GPS and GLONASS system time.A more desirable method for introducing a independent unknown parameter of fifth receiver,which can be canceled out when forming difference measurements,is discussed.The error of orbit integration and the error of transformation parameters are addressed in detail.Results of numerical integration are give.To deal with the influence of ionospheric delay,a method for forming dual-frequency ionospheric free carrier phase measurements is detailed.     

Integrated Navigation System and Experiment of a Low-Cost and Low-Accuracy SINS/GPS

When SINS (strap-down inertial navigation system) is combined with GPS, the observability of the course angle is weak. Although the course angle error is improved to some extent through Kalman filtering, the course angle still assumes a divergent trend. This trend is aggravated further when using low-cost and low-accuracy SINS. In order to restrain this trend, a method that uses AHRS to substitute for SINS course angle information is put forward aimed at the hardware component characteristic of the low-cost and low-accuracy SINS including AHRS (attitude and heading reference system) and IMU (inertial measurement unit). Real static and dynamic experiments show that the method can restrain the divergent trend of the navigation system angle effectively, and the positioning accuracy is high.     

GIS-based Assessment and Management of Nitrogen and Phosphorus in R?nne? River Catchment, Sweden

Eutrophication in lakes, estuaries and rivers occur due to over-enrichment with nutrients. Amongst the various nutrients Nitrogen (N) and Phosphorous (P) are the elements which are considered as the major pollutants. The present study looks into the problem of managing nutrient losses both from point sources and diffuse sources. The study was carried out in the River R?nne? catchment in South of Sweden where N and P have been assessed by creation of a pollution inventory based on GIS technology. The nutrient loads from different land use types were estimated using export coefficients and evaluated using monitoring data. A comparative analysis is done on the measured and estimated N and P leaching from diffused sources and point sources. Protective zones were suggested to decrease the P export from agricultural land, and the distribution of construction cost was analyzed among administrative regions according to the proportion of catchments, cultivated land, nutrient leaching, protective zone and length of river section within each municipality. The estimated error of the nutrient amount from landuse using GIS is 9.75% and 12.71% for N and P, respectively. The diffused sources contribute 91.53% and 94.74% of the total N and total P respectively, so the creation of a protective zone could be an effective way to decrease the nutrient export. The study demonstrates the power of GIS as a tool to analyze problems related to environmental monitoring and planning at administrative level, which could help in decision making and support for better management of the water resources.     

Setting-up local “mapping geoids” with the aid of GPS/LEV traverses. Application to the geoids of Sardinia and Calabria

The problem of fitting a pre-existing geoid on local GPS/LEV points is first taken into account, a possible way for its solution is proposed, based on techniques similar to the aerophotogrammetric absolute orientation.This approach is then used to compute themapping geoids of Sardinia and Calabria i.e. geoids with decimetric accuracy, needed for the heigthing of large scale maps. The pre-existing geoids EAGGI by Brennecke et al. (1983), and EGG2 by Denker et al (1993) are utilized, fitted on points of GPS/LEV traverses.The complete input-output data, the contour maps of both geoids, and a substantial checking on some Calabrian GPS/TRIG points of the entreprise IGM.95 are finally reported.     

GPS Dynamic Monitoring Analysis of Long-Span Experiment and Result Cable-Stayed Bridge

For the sake of timely appraising the working condition of the bridge, measuring the dynamic Characteristics of the bridge structure is very important and necessary. A GPS dynamic monitoring test was carried out in the Wuhan Baishazhou Bridge, which is one of the longest span cable-stayed bridges having been built in China. This paper introduces the experimental implementing scheme and data processing method. The vibration characteristics of the middle span of cable-stayed bridge are availably obtained by use of the spectral analytic approach. The measuring results are very identical to the theoretical designed values. The research demonstrates that, with GPS receiver of the high sampling rate and suitable data processing method, the vibration characteristics of the bridge structure can be determined with high accuracy.     

BDS–GPS inter-system bias of code observation and its preliminary analysis

Navigation applications will benefit significantly from the improved reliability, availability, and accuracy offered by combining BeiDou Navigation Satellite System (BDS) and Global Positioning System (GPS). In the BDS/GPS navigation data fusion model, the effect of inter-system bias (ISB) must be considered. We present a detailed analysis of the pseudorange measurements for BDS and GPS and demonstrate the existence of code ISB in BDS/GPS measurements. The ISB mainly consists of the time system offset, the coordinate system difference, and the inter-system hardware delay bias. A method based on statistical hypothesis testing is proposed to assess the stability and difference of the BDS–GPS ISB. Real data from 18 stations equipped with six types of receivers are used to compute the ISB. The results illustrate that (a) receiver-dependent ISBs are evident and comparatively consistent, with the maximum ISB observed in our experiments being ?1516 ns, (b) these receiver-dependent ISBs exhibit great stability in terms of their standard deviation and intra-day variation, and (c) the estimated ISBs for each BDS satellite type with respect to GPS are consistent.     

Computation of GPS P1–P2 Differential Code Biases with JASON-2

GPS Differential Code Biases (DCBs) computation is usually based on ground networks of permanent stations. The drawback of the classical methods is the need for the ionospheric delay so that any error in this quantity will map into the solution. Nowadays, many low-orbiting satellites are equipped with GPS receivers which are initially used for precise orbitography. Considering spacecrafts at an altitude above the ionosphere, the ionized contribution comes from the plasmasphere, which is less variable in time and space. Based on GPS data collected onboard JASON-2 spacecraft, we present a methodology which computes in the same adjustment the satellite and receiver DCBs in addition to the plasmaspheric vertical total electron content (VTEC) above the satellite, the average satellite bias being set to zero. Results show that GPS satellite DCB solutions are very close to those of the IGS analysis centers using ground measurements. However, the receiver DCB and VTEC are closely correlated, and their value remains sensitive to the choice of the plasmaspheric parametrization.     

Spatiotemporal filtering of regional GNSS network’s position time series with missing data using principle component analysis

The existing spatiotemporal analysis methods suppose that the involved time series are complete and have the same data interval. However missing data inevitably occur in the position time series of Global Navigation Satellite Systems networks for many reasons. In this paper, we develop a modified principal component analysis to extract the Common Mode Error (CME) from the incomplete position time series. The principle of the proposed method is that a time series can be reproduced from its principle components. The method is equivalent to the method of Dong et al. (J Geophys Res 111:3405–3421, 2006) in case of no missing data in the time series and to the extended ‘stacking’ approach under the assumption of a uniformly spatial response. The new method is first applied to extract the CME from the position time series of the Crustal Movement Observation Network of China (CMONOC) over the period of 1999–2009 where the missing data occur in all stations with the different gaps. The results show that the CMEs are significant in CMONOC. The size of the first principle components for the North, East and Up coordinates are as large as 40, 41 and 37 % of total principle components and their spatial responses are not uniform. The minimum amplitudes of the first eigenvectors are only 41, 15 and 29 % for the North, East and Up coordinate components, respectively. The extracted CMEs of our method are close to the data filling method, and the Root Mean Squared error (RMS) values computed from the differences of maximum CMEs between two methods are only 0.31, 0.52 and 1.55 mm for North, East and Up coordinates, respectively. The RMS of the position time series is greatly reduced after filtering out the CMEs. The accuracies of the reconstructed missing data using the two methods are also comparable. To further comprehensively test the efficiency of our method, the repeated experiments are then carried out by randomly deleting different percentages of data at some stations. The results show that the CMEs can be extracted with high accuracy at the non missing-data epochs. And at the missing-data epochs, the accuracy of extracted CMEs has a strong dependence on the number of stations with missing data.     

Temporal data mining using genetic algorithm and neural network —A case study of air pollutant forecasts

This paper integrates genetic algorithm and neural network techniques to build new temporal predicting analysis tools for geographic information system (GIS). These new GIS tools can be readily applied in a practical and appropriate manner in spatial and temporal research to patch the gaps in GIS data mining and knowledge discovery functions. The specific achievement here is the integration of related artificial intelligent technologies into GIS software to establish a conceptual spatial and temporal analysis framework. And, by using this framework to develop an artificial intelligent spatial and temporal information analyst (ASIA) system which then is fully utilized in the existing GIS package. This study of air pollutants forecasting provides a geographical practical case to prove the rationalization and justness of the conceptual temporal analysis framework.     

Assessment of crop stress conditions using low altitude aerial color‐infrared photography and computer image processing

Stress conditions on various crops caused by moisture deficiency, nutrient deficiency and plant diseases were studied using low altitude aerial color‐infrared (CIR) photography. A remotely controlled aircraft, carrying a color video camera and a 35 mm reflex camera, flying at altitudes of 50 to 100 m, was used for obtaining aerial photography. The CIR transparencies recorded for different crops were scanned into an AT 386 desktop computer and processed by MIPS software using on screen interpretation to classify crop stress conditions. In a rootrot‐affected lemon orchard diseased trees could be identified and differentiated from healthy trees. Soybean plots under moisture stress were classified into high, moderate and low stress levels. These stress levels related well with infrared (IR) thermal measurements of the crop canopy. In a wheat field experiment that was fertilized at different levels of phosphorus (P), areas with P deficiency and sufficient P could be classified on the processed CIR image. Soil P and wheat yield correlated well with the classified CIR image. Results indicate that low altitude CIR aerial photography obtained from remotely controlled aircraft and image processing computers can be a relative inexpensive tool to assess crop stress conditions.