基于CORS数据反演江苏上空电离层电子密度

本文利用IRI2007模型和江苏CORS网数据,结合附加约束的同时迭代重构算法,反演了地磁平静日江苏上空电子密度的结构分布。结果表明,整个研究区域电子密度在不同纬度和不同高度上存在明显的日变特征,电子密度最大值出现在北京时13～15时,随着时间推移,峰值幅度衰减;白天出现明显的E层,夜晚消失;反演结果说明了电离层三维层析技术为监测电离层时空结构提供了一种强有力的实验支持。     

Total electron content processing from GPS observations to facilitate ionospheric modeling

With the increasing global distribution of high rate dual-frequency global positioning system (GPS) receivers, the production of a real-time atmospheric constituent definition, total electron content (TEC), has become a beneficial contributor to the modeling applications used in the assessment of GPS position accuracy and the composition of the ionosphere, plasmasphere, and troposphere. Historically, TEC measurements have been obtained through post processing techniques to produce the quality of data necessary for modeling applications with rigorous error estimate requirements. These procedures necessitated the collection of large volumes of data to address the various abnormalities in the computation of TEC associated with the use of greater data quality controls and source selection while real-time modeling environments must rely on autonomous controls and filtration techniques to prevent the production of erroneous model results. In this paper we present methods for processing TEC in real time, which utilize several procedures including the application of an ionospheric model to automatically perform quality control on the TEC output and the computational techniques used to address receiver multipath, faulty receiver observations, cycle-slips, segmented processing, and receiver calibrations. The resulting TEC measurements are provided with rigorous error estimates validated using the vertical TEC from the Jason satellite mission.

GPS radio occultation measurements on ionospheric electron density from low Earth orbit

Since the proof-of-concept GPS/Meteorology (GPS/MET) experiment successfully demonstrated active limb sounding of the Earth’s neutral atmosphere and ionosphere via GPS radio occultation (RO) from low Earth orbit, the developments of electron density (n _e) retrieval techniques and powerful processing systems have made a significant progress in recent years. In this study, the researches of n _e profiling from space-based GPS RO observations are briefly reviewed. Applying to the Formosat-3/Constellation Observing System for Meteorology, Ionosphere and Climate (FS3/COSMIC) data, we also present a compensatory Abel inversion technique including the effects of large-scale horizontal gradients and/or inhomogeneous ionospheric n _e obtained from an improved near real-time phenomenological model of the TaiWan Ionospheric Model. The results were evaluated by the ionosonde foF2 and foE data and showed improvements of rms foF2 difference from 29.2 to 16.5% in relative percentage and rms foE difference from 54.2 to 32.7% over the standard Abel inversion.     

On the optimal height of ionospheric shell for single-site TEC estimation

The ionospheric shell height has an impact on the estimated differential code bias (DCB) and total electron content (TEC) obtained by global navigation satellite system (GNSS) data, especially for a single site. However, the shell height is generally considered as a fixed value. Based on data from the international GNSS service (IGS), we propose the concept of optimal ionospheric shell height, which minimizes |ΔDCB| when compared to the DCB provided by Center for Orbit Determination in Europe (CODE). Based on the data from five IGS stations at high, middle, and low latitudes during the time 2003–2013, we investigate the variation in the optimal ionospheric shell height and its relation with the solar activity. Results indicate that the relation between the mean of the optimal ionospheric shell height and the latitude is N-shaped. At the three stations at midlatitude, the mean value almost increases linearly with the latitude. The optimal ionospheric shell heights show 11-year and 1-year periods. The influences of the solar activity are related to the means of the optimal ionospheric shell height during the time 2003–2013. The slope of the linear fitting decreases with the mean value. Using the data from 2003 to 2013, we estimate the daily optimal ionospheric shell heights for 2014 by using the Fourier fitting method and then calculate the daily average of ΔDCB of the observed satellites by comparing to CODE results. The statistical results of the daily average in 2014 show that the optimal ionospheric shell height is much better than the fixed one. From the high-latitude station to the low-latitude station, the improvements in the mean value are about 75, 92, 96, 50, and 88% and the root-mean-squares are reduced by about 0.16, 2.09, 2.01, 1.01, and 0.02 TECu, respectively.     

Simulation study of the influence of the ionospheric layer height in the thin layer ionospheric model

This work aims to contribute to the understanding of the influence of the ionospheric layer height (ILH) on the thin layer ionospheric model (TLIM) used to retrieve ionospheric information from the GNSS observations. Particular attention is paid to the errors caused on the estimation of the vertical total electron content (vTEC) and the GNSS satellites and receivers inter-frequency biases (IFB), by the use of an inappropriate ILH. The work relies upon numerical simulations performed with an empirical model of the Earth’s ionosphere: the model is used to create realistic but controlled ionospheric scenarios and the errors are evaluated after recovering those scenarios with the TLIM. The error assessment is performed in the Central and the northern part of the South American continents, a region where large errors are expected due to the combined actions of the Appleton Anomaly of the ionosphere and the South-Atlantic anomaly of the geomagnetic field. According to this study, there does not exist a unique ILH that cancels the vTEC error for the whole region under consideration. The ILH that cancels the regional mean vTEC error varies with the solar activity and season. The latitude-dependent conversion error propagates to the parameters of the model used to represent the latitudinal variation on the vTEC on the ionospheric layer, and to the IFB, when these values are simultaneously estimated from the observed sTEC. Besides, the ILH that cancels the regional mean vTEC error is different from the one that cancels the IFB error and the difference between both ILH varies with the solar activity and season.     

不同全球电离层格网产品在中国区域的应用精度评估与分析

基于全球卫星导航系统(GNSS)跟踪站和Jason测高卫星获得的电离层总电子含量(TEC),系统评估了国内外5家国际GNSS服务(IGS)电离层分析中心以及全球连续监测评估系统(iG-MAS)综合中心的预报、快速和最终全球电离层格网产品(GIM)在中国区域的精度和标准单点定位应用性能.结果表明:不同类型GIM产品在中国...     

Temporal and spatial variations of global ionospheric total electron content under various solar conditions

By utilizing the numerical technique of principal component analysis (PCA), this work analyses temporal and spatial variations of the ionosphere under various solar conditions during the period 1999–2013. Applying the PCA technique to the time series of the global ionospheric total electron content (TEC) maps provides an efficient method for analyzing the main ionospheric variability on a global scale that is able to decompose periodic variations (e.g., annual and semiannual oscillations) while retaining the asymmetry in the temporal and spatial domains (e.g., seasonal and equator anomalies). The TEC series of different local times are processed separately at two time scales: (1) the whole 15 years of the period of study and (2) the individual years. In contrast with previous studies, the analysis of the dataset of the 15 years shows that dawn (e.g., LT4–6) and late morning (LT10–12) are the more remarkable characteristic times for ionospheric variability. This study also reveals a cyclic trend of the variability with respect to local times. The first two modes, which contain 80–90% of the total variance, represent spatial distributions and temporal variations with respect to the different stages of the solar cycle and local times. Annual and semiannual variations are demodulated from the first two modes, and the results show that these variations evidently have distinct trends for daytime and nighttime. An exception is that, under active solar conditions, extremely strong solar irradiance during the daytime has a residual effect on the variability of the nighttime.     

GPS slant total electron content accuracy using the single layer model under different geomagnetic regions and ionospheric conditions

The use of observations from the Global Positioning System (GPS) has significantly impacted the study of the ionosphere. As it is widely known, dual-frequency GPS observations can provide very precise estimation of the slant Total Electron Content (sTEC—the linear integral of the electron density along a ray-path) and that the precision level is bounded by the carrier-phase noise and multi-path effects on both frequencies. Despite its precision, GPS sTEC estimations can be systematically affected by errors in the estimation of the satellites and receivers by Inter-Frequency Biases (IFB) that are simultaneously determined with the sTEC. Thus, the ultimate accuracy of the GPS sTEC estimation is determined by the errors with which the IFBs are estimated. This contribution attempts to assess the accuracy of IFBs estimation techniques based on the single layer model for different ionospheric regions (low, mid and high magnetic latitude); different seasons (summer and winter solstices and spring and autumn equinoxes); different solar activity levels (high and low); and different geomagnetic conditions (quiet and very disturbed). The followed strategy relies upon the generation of a synthetic data set free of IFB, multi-path, measurement noise and of any other error source. Therefore, when a data set with such properties is used as the input of the IFB estimation algorithms, any deviation from zero on the estimated IFBs should be taken as indications of the errors introduced by the estimation technique. The truthfulness of this assessment work is warranted by the fact that the synthetic data sets resemble, as realistically as possible, the different conditions that may happen in the real ionosphere. The results of this work show that during the high solar activity period the accuracy for the estimated sTEC is approximately of ±10 TECu for the low geomagnetic region and of ±2.2 TECu for the mid-latitude. During low solar activity the accuracy can be assumed to be in the order of ±2 TECu. For the geomagnetic high-disturbed period, the results show that the accuracy is degraded for those stations located over the region where the storm has the strongest impact, but for those stations over regions where the storm has a moderate effect, the accuracy is comparable to that obtained in the quiet period.     

Monitoring Seasonal Variations of Ionospheric TEC Using GPS Measurements

The regional ionospheric model is adopted to determine satellite-plus-receiver differential delay. The satellite-plus-receiver differential delay is estimated as constant values for each day. Dual-frequency GPS pseudo-ranges observables are used to compute vertical TEC (VTEC). All the monthly mean VTEC profiles are represented by graphs using GPS data of the Beijing IGS site between 2000 and 2004. The monthly averaged values and amplitudes of VTEC are also represented by graphs. The results indicate that the VTEC has seasonal dependency. The monthly averaged values and amplitudes of VTEC in 2000 are about 2 times larger than that in 2004. The maximum VTEC values are observed in March and April, while the minimum VTEC values are observed in December. The seasonal variations trend is found to be similar after polynomial fitting between 2000 and 2004.     

2005珠峰GPS测量大地高确定

珠峰大地高确定是计算珠峰海拔高程一个关键环节。2005珠峰GPS测量大地高确定主要包括青藏地区GPS监测网、珠峰地区GPS控制网和珠峰峰顶GPS联测三部分;并利用GPS峰顶联测数据直接计算大地高。本文结合珠峰峰顶GPS观测自然环境恶劣的特点,分析比较了各种计算方案,确定了一种较为合理的解算珠峰大地高的GPS数据处理方法,获得了较为满意的珠峰大地高计算结果。     

Climatological study of ionospheric irregularities over the European mid-latitude sector with GPS

High-frequency variability of the ionosphere, or irregularities, constitutes the main threat for real-time precise positioning techniques based on Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) measurements. Indeed, during periods of enhanced ionospheric variability, GNSS users in the field—who cannot verify the integrity of their measurements—will experience positioning errors that can reach several decimeters, while the nominal accuracy of the technique is cm-level. In the frame of this paper, a climatological analysis of irregularities over the European mid-latitude region is presented. Based on a 10 years GPS dataset over Belgium, the work analyzes the occurrence rate (as a function of the solar cycle, season and local time) as well as the amplitude of ionospheric irregularities observed at a single GPS station. The study covers irregularities either due to space weather events (solar origin) or of terrestrial origin. If space weather irregularities are responsible for the largest effects in terms of ionospheric error, their occurrence rate highly depends on solar activity. Indeed, the occurrence rate of ionospheric irregularities is about 9 % during solar maximum, whereas it drops to about 0 % during medium or low solar activity periods. Medium-scale ionospheric disturbances (MSTIDs) occurring during daytime in autumn/winter are the most recurrent pattern of the time series, with yearly proportions slightly varying with the solar cycle and an amplitude of about 10 % of the TEC background. Another recurrent irregularity type, though less frequent than MSTIDs, is the noise-like variability in TEC observed during summer nighttime, under quiet geomagnetic conditions. These summer nighttime irregularities exhibit amplitudes ranging between 8 and 15 % of the TEC background.     

Determination of the ionospheric foF2 using a stand-alone GPS receiver

The critical frequency of ionospheric F2 layer (foF2) is a measure of the highest frequency of radio signal that may be reflected back by the F2 layer, and it is associated with ionospheric peak electron density in the F2 layer. Accurate long-term foF2 variations are usually derived from ionosonde observations. In this paper, we propose a new method to observe foF2 using a stand-alone global positioning system (GPS) receiver. The proposed method relies on the mathematical equation that relates foF2 to GPS observations. The equation is then implemented in the Kalman filter algorithm to estimate foF2 at every epoch of the observation (30-s rate). Unlike existing methods, the proposed method does not require any additional information from ionosonde observations and does not require any network of GPS receivers. It only requires as inputs the ionospheric scale height and the modeled plasmaspheric electron content, which practically can be derived from any existing ionospheric/plasmaspheric model. We applied the proposed method to estimate long-term variations of foF2 at three GPS stations located at the northern hemisphere (NICO, Cyprus), the southern hemisphere (STR1, Australia) and the south pole (SYOG, Antarctic). To assess the performance of the proposed method, we then compared the results against those derived by ionosonde observations and the International Reference Ionosphere (IRI) 2012 model. We found that, during the period of high solar activity (2011–2012), the values of absolute mean bias between foF2 derived by the proposed method and ionosonde observations are in the range of 0.2–0.5 MHz, while those during the period of low solar activity (2009–2010) are in the range of 0.05–0.15 MHz. Furthermore, the root-mean-square-error (RMSE) values during high and low solar activities are in the range of 0.8–0.9 MHz and of 0.6–0.7 MHz, respectively. We also noticed that the values of absolute mean bias and RMSE between foF2 derived by the proposed method and the IRI-2012 model are slightly larger than those between the proposed method and ionosonde observations. These results demonstrate that the proposed method can estimate foF2 with a comparable accuracy. Since the proposed method can estimate foF2 at every epoch of the observation, it therefore has promising applications for investigating various scales (from small to large) of foF2 irregularities.     

NeQuick电离层模型在中国地区的应用

电离层延迟是影响GPS绝对定位精度的主要因素,对单频接收机尤为明显,Galileo系统广播星历拟采用NeQuick模型作为其电离层模型。本文介绍了NeQuick模型及其模型最优化,给出了利用NeQuick模型计算电离层总电子含量(TEC)的方法,利用国内部分观测台链提供的北京和武汉的TEC,并与NeQuick模型所给出的结果进行对比分析,最后给出NeQuick模型在中国地区使用的初步结论。     

Determining receiver biases in GPS-derived total electron content in the auroral oval and polar cap region using ionosonde measurements

Global Positioning System (GPS) total electron content (TEC) measurements, although highly precise, are often rendered inaccurate due to satellite and receiver differential code biases (DCBs). Calculated satellite DCB values are now available from a variety of sources, but receiver DCBs generally remain an undertaking of receiver operators and processing centers. A procedure for removing these receiver DCBs from GPS-derived ionospheric TEC at high latitudes, using Canadian Advanced Digital Ionosonde (CADI) measurements, is presented. Here, we will test the applicability of common numerical methods for estimating receiver DCBs in high-latitude regions and compare our CADI-calibrated GPS vertical TEC (vTEC) measurements to corresponding International GNSS Service IONEX-interpolated vTEC map data. We demonstrate that the bias values determined using the CADI method are largely independent of the topside model (exponential, Epstein, and α-Chapman) used. We further confirm our results via comparing bias-calibrated GPS vTEC with those derived from incoherent scatter radar (ISR) measurements. These CADI method results are found to be within 1.0 TEC units (TECU) of ISR measurements. The numerical methods tested demonstrate agreement varying from within 1.6 TECU to in excess of 6.0 TECU when compared to ISR measurements.     

Tomographic reconstruction of ionospheric electron density based on constrained algebraic reconstruction technique

A constrained algebraic reconstruction technique (CART) is proposed for the tomographic reconstruction of the ionospheric electron density distribution. The method uses a popular two-dimensional multi-point finite difference approximation of the second order Laplace operator to provide the constraint matrix. The tomographic results of a numerical simulation show that the reconstruction accuracy of electron density distribution is significantly improved. A careful validation of the reliability and superiority of CART is made. Finally, we applied the new method to the analysis of actual Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) observations and compared the results with ionosonde observation of Wuhan station.     

全极化SAR数据反演桥面高度

根据高分辨率SAR图像上建筑区的影像特征, 提出了基于灰度共生矩阵(gray-level cooccurrence Matrix, GLCM)纹理分析的建筑区提取方法, 该方法由初步定位和边界调整2个步骤组成, 均遵循特征计算、基于Bhattacharyya距离的特征选择和KNN分类流程, 所不同的是2个步骤中分别采用了逐块和逐点计算纹理特征的方式以兼顾纹理分析的效率和准确性。文中对不同SAR传感器获取的图像进行了实验。实验结果表明, 选用具有最大Bhattacharyya距离值的3或4个特征可以获得较好的初步定位结果, 建筑区的检测率超过80%, 虚警率低于10%;随着边界调整的进行, 检测到的建筑区边界逐渐接近于真实边界。实验结果验证了该算法的有效性。     

Mutual validation of GNSS height measurements and high-precision geometric-astronomical leveling

The method of geometric-astronomical leveling is presented as a suited technique for the validation of GNSS (Global Navigation Satellite System) heights. In geometric-astronomical leveling, the ellipsoidal height differences are obtained by combining conventional spirit leveling and astronomical leveling. Astronomical leveling with recently developed digital zenith camera systems is capable of providing the geometry of equipotential surfaces of the gravity field accurate to a few 0.1 mm per km. This is comparable to the accuracy of spirit leveling. Consequently, geometric-astronomical leveling yields accurate ellipsoidal height differences that may serve as an independent check on GNSS height measurements at local scales. A test was performed in a local geodetic network near Hanover. GPS observations were simultaneously carried out at five stations over a time span of 48 h and processed considering state-of-the-art techniques and sophisticated new approaches to reduce station-dependent errors. The comparison of GPS height differences with those from geometric-astronomical leveling shows a promising agreement of some millimeters. The experiment indicates the currently achievable accuracy level of GPS height measurements and demonstrates the practical applicability of the proposed approach for the validation of GNSS height measurements as well as the evaluation of GNSS height processing strategies.     

Automated GPS processing for global total electron content data

A software package known as MIT Automated Processing of GPS (MAPGPS) has been developed to automate the processing of GPS data into global total electron density (TEC) maps. The goal of the MAPGPS software is to produce reliable TEC data automatically, although not yet in real time. Observations are used from all available GPS receivers during all geomagnetic conditions where data has been successfully collected. In this paper, the architecture of the MAPGPS software is described. Particular attention is given to the algorithms used to estimate the individual receiver biases. One of the largest sources of error in estimating TEC from GPS data is the determination of these unknown receiver biases. The MAPGPS approach to solving the receiver bias problem uses three different methods: minimum scalloping, least squares, and zero-TEC. These methods are described in detail, along with their relative performance characteristics. A brief comparison of the JPL and MAPGPS receiver biases is presented, and a possible remaining error source in the receiver bias estimation is discussed. Finally, the Madrigal database, which allows Web access to the MAPGPS TEC data and maps, is described.     

多GNSS监测下中国区域电离层格网模型可用性分析

多系统全球卫星导航系统(GNSS)的出现为天基增强系统(SBAS)电离层格网模型的性能提升提供了可能,但多系统GNSS测量对电离层格网模型性能提升是有条件的. 为此,利用中国区域GPS观测模拟分析了多系统GNSS测量对中国区域电离层格网模型可用性的影响. 结果表明:多系统GNSS测量可有效提高电离层格网模型的覆盖范围. 中国南方地区存在低纬赤道电离异常(EIA)现象,严重影响SBAS电离层格网模型实现性能,单纯增加GNSS测量不能有效应对低纬电离异常现象影响. 中国北方地区电离层延迟变化平缓,在多系统GNSS测量情况下可以考虑减少地面监测站数量,仍能保持系统原有性能.