Undifferenced ionospheric-free ambiguity resolution using GLONASS data from inhomogeneous stations

GLONASS frequency division multiple access signals render ambiguity resolution (AR) rather difficult because: (1) Different wavelengths are used by different satellites, and (2) pseudorange inter-frequency biases (IFBs) cannot be precisely modeled by means of a simple function. In this study, an AR approach based on the ionospheric-free combination with a wavelength of about 5.3 cm is assessed for GLONASS precise point positioning (PPP). This approach simplifies GLONASS AR because pseudorange IFBs do not matter, and PPP-AR can be enabled across inhomogeneous receivers. One month of GLONASS data from 165 European stations were processed for different network size and different durations of observation periods. We find that 89.9% of the fractional parts of ionospheric-free ambiguities agree well within ± 0.15 cycles for a small network (radius = 500 km), while 77.6% for a large network (radius = 2000 km). In case of the 3-hourly GLONASS-only static PPP solutions for the small network, reliable AR can be achieved where the number of fixed GLONASS ambiguities account for 97.6% within all candidate ambiguities. Meanwhile, the RMS of the east, north and up components with respect to daily solutions is improved from 1.0, 0.6, 1.2 cm to 0.4, 0.4, 1.1 cm, respectively. When GPS PPP-AR is carried out simultaneously, the positioning performance can be improved significantly such that the GLONASS ambiguity fixing rate rises from 74.4 to 95.4% in case of hourly solutions. Finally, we introduce ambiguity-fixed GLONASS orbits to re-attempt GLONASS PPP-AR in contrast to the above solutions with ambiguity-float orbits. We find that ambiguity-fixed orbits lead to clearly better agreement among ionospheric-free ambiguity fractional parts in case of the large network, that is 80.5% of fractional parts fall in ± 0.15 cycles in contrast to 74.6% for the ambiguity-float orbits. We conclude that highly efficient GLONASS ionospheric-free PPP-AR is achievable in case of a few hours of data when GPS PPP-AR is also accomplished, and ambiguity-fixed GLONASS orbits will contribute significantly to PPP-AR over wide areas.     

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.     

Integrating GPS and GLONASS to accelerate convergence and initialization times of precise point positioning

The main challenge of dual-frequency precise point positioning (PPP) is that it requires about 30 min to obtain centimeter-level accuracy or to succeed in the first ambiguity-fixing. Currently, PPP is generally conducted with GPS only using the ionosphere-free combination. We adopt a single-differenced (SD) between-satellite PPP model to combine the GPS and GLONASS raw dual-frequency carrier phase measurements, in which the GPS satellite with the highest elevation is selected as the reference satellite to form the SD between-satellite measurements. We use a 7-day data set from 178 IGS stations to investigate the contribution of GLONASS observations to both ambiguity-float and ambiguity-fixed SD PPP solutions, in both kinematic and static modes. In ambiguity-fixed PPP, we only attempt to fix GPS integer ambiguities, leaving GLONASS ambiguities as float values. Numerous experimental results show that PPP with GLONASS and GPS requires much less convergence time than that of PPP with GPS alone. For ambiguity-float PPP, the average convergence time can be reduced by 45.9 % from 22.9 to 12.4 min in static mode and by 57.9 % from 40.6 to 17.7 min in kinematic mode, respectively. For ambiguity-fixed PPP, the average time to the first-fixed solution can be reduced by 27.4 % from 21.6 to 15.7 min in static mode and by 42.0 % from 34.4 to 20.0 min in kinematic mode, respectively. Experimental results also show that the less the GPS satellites are used in float PPP, the more significant is the reduction in convergence time when adding GLONASS observations. In addition, on average, more than 4 GLONASS satellites can be observed for most 2-h observation sessions. Nearly, the same improvement in convergence time reduction is achieved for those observations.     

Estimation and evaluation of real-time precipitable water vapor from GLONASS and GPS

The revitalized Russian GLONASS system provides new potential for real-time retrieval of zenith tropospheric delays (ZTD) and precipitable water vapor (PWV) in order to support time-critical meteorological applications such as nowcasting or severe weather event monitoring. In this study, we develop a method of real-time ZTD/PWV retrieval based on GLONASS and/or GPS observations. The performance of ZTD and PWV derived from GLONASS data using real-time precise point positioning (PPP) technique is carefully investigated and evaluated. The potential of combining GLONASS and GPS data for ZTD/PWV retrieving is assessed as well. The GLONASS and GPS observations of about half a year for 80 globally distributed stations from the IGS (International GNSS Service) network are processed. The results show that the real-time GLONASS ZTD series agree quite well with the GPS ZTD series in general: the RMS of ZTD differences is about 8 mm (about 1.2 mm in PWV). Furthermore, for an inter-technique validation, the real-time ZTD estimated from GLONASS-only, GPS-only, and the GPS/GLONASS combined solutions are compared with those derived from very long baseline interferometry (VLBI) at colocated GNSS/VLBI stations. The comparison shows that GLONASS can contribute to real-time meteorological applications, with almost the same accuracy as GPS. More accurate and reliable water vapor values, about 1.5–2.3 mm in PWV, can be achieved when GLONASS observations are combined with the GPS ones in the real-time PPP data processing. The comparison with radiosonde data further confirms the performance of GLONASS-derived real-time PWV and the benefit of adding GLONASS to stand-alone GPS processing.     

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.     

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.     

利用GPS/BDS/GLONASS/Galileo组合PPP反演大气可降水量

为进一步改善精密单点定位（PPP）探测大气可降水量（PWV）的性能,本文提出采用GPS/BDS/GLONASS/Galileo组合PPP进行PWV反演的方法,并利用国内3个MGEX（multi-GNSS experiment）观测站的实测数据,对GPS/BDS/GLONASS/Galileo组合PPP在大气水汽探测方面的性能进行了评估。试验结果表明：相较于GPS PPP、GPS/BDS组合PPP和GPS/GLONASS组合PPP,GPS/BDS/GLONASS/Galileo组合PPP估计天顶对流层延迟（ZTD）的初始化时间分别缩短了33%、26%、20%,且能获得更高精度的ZTD估值和PWV信息,在大气水汽探测方面的性能更优。     

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.     

GLONASS pseudorange inter-channel biases and their effects on combined GPS/GLONASS precise point positioning

Combined GPS/GLONASS precise point positioning (PPP) can obtain a more precise and reliable position than GPS PPP. However, because of frequency division multiple access, GLONASS carrier phase and pseudorange observations suffer from inter-channel biases (ICBs) which will influence the accuracy and convergence speed of combined GPS/GLONASS PPP. With clear understanding of the characteristics of carrier phase ICBs, we estimated undifferenced GLONASS pseudorange ICBs for 133 receivers from five manufacturers and analyzed their characteristics. In general, pseudorange ICBs corresponding to the same firmware have strong correlations. The ICB values of two receivers with the same firmware may be different because of different antenna types, and their differences are closely related to frequency. Pseudorange ICBs should be provided for each satellite to obtain more precise ICBs as the pseudorange ICBs may vary even on the same frequency. For the solutions of standard point positioning (SPP), after pseudorange ICB calibration, the mean root mean square (RMS) improvements of GLONASS SPP reach up to 57, 48, and 53 % for the East, North, and Up components, while combined GPS/GLONASS SPP reach up to 27, 17, and 23 %, respectively. The combined GPS/GLONASS PPP after pseudorange ICB calibration evidently improved the convergence speed, and the mean RMS of PPP improved by almost 50 % during the convergence period.     

Multi-GNSS phase delay estimation and PPP ambiguity resolution: GPS,BDS, GLONASS,Galileo

This paper focuses on the precise point positioning (PPP) ambiguity resolution (AR) using the observations acquired from four systems: GPS, BDS, GLONASS, and Galileo (GCRE). A GCRE four-system uncalibrated phase delay (UPD) estimation model and multi-GNSS undifferenced PPP AR method were developed in order to utilize the observations from all systems. For UPD estimation, the GCRE-combined PPP solutions of the globally distributed MGEX and IGS stations are performed to obtain four-system float ambiguities and then UPDs of GCRE satellites can be precisely estimated from these ambiguities. The quality of UPD products in terms of temporal stability and residual distributions is investigated for GPS, BDS, GLONASS, and Galileo satellites, respectively. The BDS satellite-induced code biases were corrected for GEO, IGSO, and MEO satellites before the UPD estimation. The UPD results of global and regional networks were also evaluated for Galileo and BDS, respectively. As a result of the frequency-division multiple-access strategy of GLONASS, the UPD estimation was performed using a network of homogeneous receivers including three commonly used GNSS receivers (TRIMBLE NETR9, JAVAD TRE_G3TH DELTA, and LEICA). Data recorded from 140 MGEX and IGS stations for a 30-day period in January in 2017 were used to validate the proposed GCRE UPD estimation and multi-GNSS dual-frequency PPP AR. Our results show that GCRE four-system PPP AR enables the fastest time to first fix (TTFF) solutions and the highest accuracy for all three coordinate components compared to the single and dual system. An average TTFF of 9.21 min with \(7{^{\circ }}\) cutoff elevation angle can be achieved for GCRE PPP AR, which is much shorter than that of GPS (18.07 min), GR (12.10 min), GE (15.36 min) and GC (13.21 min). With observations length of 10 min, the positioning accuracy of the GCRE fixed solution is 1.84, 1.11, and 1.53 cm, while the GPS-only result is 2.25, 1.29, and 9.73 cm for the east, north, and vertical components, respectively. When the cutoff elevation angle is increased to \(30{^{\circ }}\), the GPS-only PPP AR results are very unreliable, while 13.44 min of TTFF is still achievable for GCRE four-system solutions.     

Modeling and assessment of combined GPS/GLONASS precise point positioning

A combination of GPS and GLONASS observations can offer improved reliability, availability and accuracy for precise point positioning (PPP). We present and analyze a combined GPS/GLONASS PPP model, including both functional and stochastic components. Numerical comparison and analysis are conducted with respect to PPP based on only GPS or GLONASS observations to demonstrate the benefits of the combined GPS/GLONASS PPP. The observation residuals are analyzed for more appropriate stochastic modeling for observations from different navigation systems. An analysis is also made using different precise orbit and clock products. The performance of the combined GPS/GLONASS PPP is assessed using both static and kinematic data. The results indicate that the convergence time can be significantly reduced with the addition of GLONASS data. The positioning accuracy, however, is not significantly improved by adding GLONASS data if there is a sufficient number of GPS satellites with good geometry.     

Triple-frequency GPS precise point positioning with rapid ambiguity resolution

At present, reliable ambiguity resolution in real-time GPS precise point positioning (PPP) can only be achieved after an initial observation period of a few tens of minutes. In this study, we propose a method where the incoming triple-frequency GPS signals are exploited to enable rapid convergences to ambiguity-fixed solutions in real-time PPP. Specifically, extra-wide-lane ambiguity resolution can be first achieved almost instantaneously with the Melbourne-Wübbena combination observable on L2 and L5. Then the resultant unambiguous extra-wide-lane carrier-phase is combined with the wide-lane carrier-phase on L1 and L2 to form an ionosphere-free observable with a wavelength of about 3.4 m. Although the noise of this observable is around 100 times the raw carrier-phase noise, its wide-lane ambiguity can still be resolved very efficiently, and the resultant ambiguity-fixed observable can assist much better than pseudorange in speeding up succeeding narrow-lane ambiguity resolution. To validate this method, we use an advanced hardware simulator to generate triple-frequency signals and a high-grade receiver to collect 1-Hz data. When the carrier-phase precisions on L1, L2 and L5 are as poor as 1.5, 6.3 and 1.5 mm, respectively, wide-lane ambiguity resolution can still reach a correctness rate of over 99 % within 20 s. As a result, the correctness rate of narrow-lane ambiguity resolution achieves 99 % within 65 s, in contrast to only 64 % within 150 s in dual-frequency PPP. In addition, we also simulate a multipath-contaminated data set and introduce new ambiguities for all satellites every 120 s. We find that when multipath effects are strong, ambiguity-fixed solutions are achieved at 78 % of all epochs in triple-frequency PPP whilst almost no ambiguities are resolved in dual-frequency PPP. Therefore, we demonstrate that triple-frequency PPP has the potential to achieve ambiguity-fixed solutions within a few minutes, or even shorter if raw carrier-phase precisions are around 1 mm. In either case, we conclude that the efficiency of ambiguity resolution in triple-frequency PPP is much higher than that in dual-frequency PPP.     

Homogeneous reprocessing of GPS,GLONASS and SLR observations

The International GNSS Service (IGS) provides operational products for the GPS and GLONASS constellation. Homogeneously processed time series of parameters from the IGS are only available for GPS. Reprocessed GLONASS series are provided only by individual Analysis Centers (i. e. CODE and ESA), making it difficult to fully include the GLONASS system into a rigorous GNSS analysis. In view of the increasing number of active GLONASS satellites and a steadily growing number of GPS+GLONASS-tracking stations available over the past few years, Technische Universität Dresden, Technische Universität München, Universität Bern and Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule Zürich performed a combined reprocessing of GPS and GLONASS observations. Also, SLR observations to GPS and GLONASS are included in this reprocessing effort. Here, we show only SLR results from a GNSS orbit validation. In total, 18 years of data (1994–2011) have been processed from altogether 340 GNSS and 70 SLR stations. The use of GLONASS observations in addition to GPS has no impact on the estimated linear terrestrial reference frame parameters. However, daily station positions show an RMS reduction of 0.3 mm on average for the height component when additional GLONASS observations can be used for the time series determination. Analyzing satellite orbit overlaps, the rigorous combination of GPS and GLONASS neither improves nor degrades the GPS orbit precision. For GLONASS, however, the quality of the microwave-derived GLONASS orbits improves due to the combination. These findings are confirmed using independent SLR observations for a GNSS orbit validation. In comparison to previous studies, mean SLR biases for satellites GPS-35 and GPS-36 could be reduced in magnitude from \(-35\) and \(-38\)  mm to \(-12\) and \(-13\)  mm, respectively. Our results show that remaining SLR biases depend on the satellite type and the use of coated or uncoated retro-reflectors. For Earth rotation parameters, the increasing number of GLONASS satellites and tracking stations over the past few years leads to differences between GPS-only and GPS+GLONASS combined solutions which are most pronounced in the pole rate estimates with maximum 0.2 mas/day in magnitude. At the same time, the difference between GLONASS-only and combined solutions decreases. Derived GNSS orbits are used to estimate combined GPS+GLONASS satellite clocks, with first results presented in this paper. Phase observation residuals from a precise point positioning are at the level of 2 mm and particularly reveal poorly modeled yaw maneuver periods.     

Multi-GNSS precise point positioning (MGPPP) using raw observations

A joint-processing model for multi-GNSS (GPS, GLONASS, BDS and GALILEO) precise point positioning (PPP) is proposed, in which raw code and phase observations are used. In the proposed model, inter-system biases (ISBs) and GLONASS code inter-frequency biases (IFBs) are carefully considered, among which GLONASS code IFBs are modeled as a linear function of frequency numbers. To get the full rank function model, the unknowns are re-parameterized and the estimable slant ionospheric delays and ISBs/IFBs are derived and estimated simultaneously. One month of data in April, 2015 from 32 stations of the International GNSS Service (IGS) Multi-GNSS Experiment (MGEX) tracking network have been used to validate the proposed model. Preliminary results show that RMS values of the positioning errors (with respect to external double-difference solutions) for static/kinematic solutions (four systems) are 6.2 mm/2.1 cm (north), 6.0 mm/2.2 cm (east) and 9.3 mm/4.9 cm (up). One-day stabilities of the estimated ISBs described by STD values are 0.36 and 0.38 ns, for GLONASS and BDS, respectively. Significant ISB jumps are identified between adjacent days for all stations, which are caused by the different satellite clock datums in different days and for different systems. Unlike ISBs, the estimated GLONASS code IFBs are quite stable for all stations, with an average STD of 0.04 ns over a month. Single-difference experiment of short baseline shows that PPP ionospheric delays are more precise than traditional leveling ionospheric delays.     

Integrating GPS and BDS to shorten the initialization time for ambiguity-fixed PPP

The main challenge of ambiguity resolution in precise point positioning (PPP) is that it requires 30 min or more to succeed in the first fixing of ambiguities. With the full operation of the BeiDou (BDS) satellite system in East Asia, it is worthwhile to investigate the performance of GPS + BDS PPP ambiguity resolution, especially the improvements of the initial fixing time and ambiguity-fixing rate compared to GPS-only solutions. We estimated the wide- and narrow-lane fractional-cycle biases (FCBs) for BDS with a regional network, and PPP ambiguity resolution was carried out at each station to assess the contribution of BDS. The across-satellite single-difference (ASSD) GPS + BDS combined ambiguity-fixed PPP model was used, in which the ASSD is applied within each system. We used a two-day data set from 48 stations. For kinematic PPP, the percentage of fixing within 10 min for GPS only (Model A) is 17.6 %, when adding IGSO and MEO of BDS (Model B), the percentage improves significantly to 42.8 %, whereas it is only 23.2 % if GEO is added (Model C) due to the low precision of GEO orbits. For static PPP, the fixing percentage is 32.9, 53.3 and 28.0 % for Model A, B and C, respectively. In order to overcome the limitation of the poor precision of GEO satellites, we also used a small network of 10 stations to analyze the contribution of GEO satellites to kinematic PPP. We took advantage of the fact that for stations of a small network the GEO satellites appear at almost the same direction, such that the GEO orbit error can be absorbed by its FCB estimates. The results show that the percentage of fixing improves from 39.5 to 57.7 % by adding GEO satellites.     

GNSS观测值统一表达及组合PPP解算性能分析

针对GNSS多系统组合进行PPP定位的问题,推导了GNSS观测值统一表达式;进而给出了基于UofC模型的多系统组合PPP的函数模型和随机模型;最后采用6个IGS观测站24 h观测数据对7种组合模型的PPP进行解算,并从收敛率、收敛速度和定位精度等方面进行了统计分析。实验结果表明,当观测时长为60 min时,GPS/GLONASS/BDS组合PPP收敛性能最好,收敛率为91.7%,平均收敛时间为16.1 min;而BDS PPP收敛性能最差,收敛率仅为32.7%,平均收敛时间为38.4 min。可见,多系统组合有利于提高精密单点定位的解算性能。对于定位精度,在观测时长较短时(如0.5 h),GPS/GLONASS/BDS组合PPP整体上具有最优的定位精度,(N,E)方向偏差和标准差分别为(0.3,0.5)cm和(1.9,4.3)cm;短时间内对流层参数与垂直方向的强相关性,将致使U方向精度较差。     

北斗三号卫星FCB估计及其模糊度固定

随着北斗卫星导航系统(BeiDou navigation satellite system, BDS)的建设和完善,更多的北斗在轨卫星开始提供全球性的定位、导航、授时服务。为了验证北斗系统整体精密单点定位-模糊度固定(precise point positioning-ambiguity resolution, PPP-AR)的效果,基于全球分布的测站2020-08-01—2020-08-31共31 d的观测数据进行GPS、BDS双系统相位小数周偏差(fractional cycle bi?as, FCB)估计, 并对其中BDS-3卫星FCB产品时变特性进行分析。结果表明,大部分BDS-3卫星宽巷FCB在31 d内保持相对稳定,变化小于0.2周, 窄巷FCB在1 d之内的变化小于0.1周。利用估计的FCB产品进行动态和静态PPP-AR解算。单BDS-3静态PPP?-AR的历元固定率可以达到89.8%,东、北、天3个方向的均方根误差（root mean square error,RMSE）分别为0.94 cm、0.73 cm和1.39 cm,动态PPP-AR的历元固定率为83.9%,东、北、天3个方向的RMSE分别为1.99 ?cm、1.70 cm和3.28 cm。     

Simultaneous estimation of GLONASS pseudorange inter-frequency biases in precise point positioning using undifferenced and uncombined observations

GLONASS precise point positioning (PPP) performance is affected by the inter-frequency biases (IFBs) due to the application of frequency division multiple access technique. In this contribution, the impact of GLONASS pseudorange IFBs on convergence performance and positioning accuracy of GLONASS-only and GPS + GLONASS PPP based on undifferenced and uncombined observation models is investigated. Through a re-parameterization process, the following four pseudorange IFB handling schemes were proposed: neglecting IFBs, modeling IFBs as a linear or quadratic polynomial function of frequency number, and estimating IFBs for each GLONASS satellite. One week of GNSS observation data from 132 International GNSS Service stations was selected to investigate the contribution of simultaneous estimation of GLONASS pseudorange IFBs on GLONASS-only and combined GPS + GLONASS PPP in both static and kinematic modes. The results show that considering IFBs can speed up the convergence of PPP using GLONASS observations by more than 20%. Apart from GLONASS-only kinematic PPP, the positioning accuracy of GLONASS-only and GPS + GLONASS PPP is comparable among the four schemes. Overall, the scheme of estimating IFBs for each GLONASS satellite outperforms the other schemes in both convergence time reduction and positioning accuracy improvement, which indicates that the GLONASS IFBs may not strictly obey a linear or quadratic function relationship with the frequency number.     

GPS/GLONASS组合精密单点定位研究

讨论了GPS/GLONASS组合精密单点定位的数学模型,并以IRKJ跟踪站的观测数据为例,分别利用GPS和GPS/GLONASS组合两种方式进行精密单点定位解算。计算结果表明,当GPS观测卫星数较多(9~10颗)时,组合GPS/GLONASS较单系统GPS的精密单点定位精度及收敛速度有一定改善,但效果不明显。当GPS卫星数较少(4~5颗)时,引入GLONASS卫星进行GPS/GLONASS组合精密单点定位,其定位精度及收敛速度较单系统GPS精密单点均有显著改善。     

Multifrequency algorithms for precise point positioning: MAP3

We present the new MAP3 algorithms to perform static precise point positioning (PPP) from multifrequency and multisystem GNSS observations. MAP3 represents a two-step strategy in which the least squares theory is applied twice to estimate smoothed pseudo-distances, initial phase ambiguities, and slant ionospheric delay first, and the absolute receiver position and its clock offset in a second adjustment. Unlike the classic PPP technique, in our new approach, the ionospheric-free linear combination is not used. The combination of signals from different satellite systems is accomplished by taking into account the receiver inter-system bias. MAP3 has been implemented in MATLAB and integrated within a complete PPP software developed on site and named PCube. We test the MAP3 performance numerically and contrast it with other external PPP programs. In general, MAP3 positioning accuracy with low-noise GPS dual-frequency observations is about 2.5 cm in 2-h observation periods, 1 cm in 10 h, and 7 mm after 1 day. This means an improvement in the accuracy in short observation periods of at least 7 mm with respect to the other PPP programs. The MAP3 convergence time is also analyzed and some results obtained from real triple-frequency GPS and GIOVE observations are presented.