星载GPS伪距多路径误差与观测噪声对自主定轨的影响分析

对搭载美国BlackJack接收机的CHAMP/GRACE-A/Jason-2卫星和搭载国产接收机的HY2A/ZY3/TH1卫星的星载GPS数据的伪距多路径误差与观测噪声进行了研究,重点分析了国产接收机伪距多路径误差的变化特性,并研究了多路径误差与观测噪声对星载GPS自主定轨的影响。结果表明:国产接收机的C/A码与P1码伪距观测精度要整体差于美国的BlackJack接收机,而P2码伪距观测精度要整体优于BlackJack接收机;国产接收机P1码伪距受多路径效应影响较大,其多路径误差随高度角减小存在单调递增的变化趋势,其中HY2A、ZY3与TH1卫星的多路径误差最大分别可达3.6 m、1.8 m与0.7 m;这种单调递增变化的多路径误差会导致星载GPS自主定轨位置结果在径向与切向产生系统性偏差。     

Effects of azimuthal multipath asymmetry on long GPS coordinate time series

Carrier phase multipath is currently one source of unmodeled signals that may bias GPS coordinate time series significantly. We investigate the effect of simulated carrier phase multipath on time series of several sites covering the period 2002.0–2008.0 and spanning a range of observation geometries. High-, mid-, and low-latitude IGS sites are investigated as well as sites with significant signal obstructions. We examine the effect of multipath in different sectors of the sky, considering time-constant, horizontal reflectors at each of 0.1, 0.2, and 1.5 m below the antenna. The differences between a horizontally uniform multipath source are analyzed, and it is shown that positioning errors are generally larger when unmodeled carrier phase multipath is azimuthally heterogeneous. Using the adopted multipath model, height biases reach ±1 mm in case of the symmetric multipath and ±5 mm for the asymmetric multipath but this increases to being ±10 mm in the worst case. In addition to mean bias, low-frequency variations in the bias also exist, including periodic signals and leading to velocity biases of up to ±0.1 mm/year in the symmetric case and ±1 mm/year in the asymmetric case over the considered period. In contrast to the generally slowly varying observation geometry that is typically experienced, we show the effects of an abrupt change in geometry due to receiver/antenna hardware changes; in the case considered, we see changed pattern of temporal variation in the bias in addition to an instantaneous offset.     

多径效应的动态特性对码跟踪环路的影响分析

接收机与卫星之间的相对运动,使得多径效应存在动态特性。针对卫星轨道的不同,分析多径效应对测距误差的影响,着重讨论静止接收机接收GEO卫星信号时出现的固有多径现象,仿真分析多径信号的衰落频率对码跟踪环路的影响。仿真结果表明,当衰落频率接近或大于码环路带宽时,多径对码跟踪精度的影响会在一定程度上被滤除;不同的卫星轨道导致多径效应的动态特性存在差异,会使测距误差在时域上表现出短时快变和长时缓变两种特征。为研究多径效应产生机理与卫星轨道因素的相关性提供了验证途径。     

Performance of the L2C civil GPS signal under various ionospheric scintillation effects

As GPS is modernizing, there are currently fourteen satellites transmitting L2C civil code and seven satellites transmitting L5 signal. While the GPS observables are subject to several sources of errors, the ionosphere is one of the largest error sources affecting GPS signals. Small irregularities in the electrons density along the GPS radio signal propagation path cause ionospheric scintillation that is characterized by rapid fluctuations in the signal amplitude and phase. The ionospheric scintillation effects are stronger in equatorial and high-latitude geomagnetic latitude regions and occur mainly due to equatorial anomaly and solar storms. Several researchers have analyzed the L2C signal quality since becoming available in December, 2005. We analyze the performance of L2C using GPS data from stations in the equatorial region of Brazil, which is subject of weak, moderate and strong ionospheric scintillation conditions. The GPS data were collected by Septentrio PolaRxS–PRO receivers as part of the CIGALA/CALIBRA network. The analysis was performed as a function of scintillations indexes S4 and Phi60, lock time (time interval in seconds that the carrier phase is tracked continuously without cycle slips), multipath RMS and position variation of precise point positioning solutions. The analysis shows that L2C code solutions are less affected by multipath effects than that of P2 when data are collected under weak ionospheric scintillation effects. In terms of analysis of positions, the kinematic PPP results using L2C instead P2 codes show accuracy improvements up to 33 % in periods of weak or strong ionospheric scintillation. When combining phase and code collected under weak scintillation effects, the results by applying L2C against P2 provide improvement in accuracy up to 59 %. However, for data under strong scintillation effects, the use of L2C for PPP with code and phase does not provide improvements in the positioning accuracy.     

TEQC multipath metrics in MATLAB

Knowledge of the local direction of multipath at a particular site is important for a number of reasons. For example, such information can be used to study site selections or during monument design for GPS installations. We present a MATLAB program for creating colorized polar maps of high-frequency multipath using TEQC report files of single-epoch data. The maps, although not necessarily indicating the actual local direction of multipath on the ground, give the orientation with respect to the geometry of the satellites in the sky. This information can aid the interpretation of ground multipath geometry at the site. We give an example of short-span data with ∼0.05 Hz multipath (i.e. repeat period ≈ 20 s) although the program can be modified for long-term measurements as well.     

Initial assessment of the COMPASS/BeiDou-3: new-generation navigation signals

The successful launch of five new-generation experimental satellites of the China’s BeiDou Navigation Satellite System, namely BeiDou I1-S, I2-S, M1-S, M2-S, and M3-S, marks a significant step in expanding BeiDou into a navigation system with global coverage. In addition to B1I (1561.098 MHz) and B3I (1269.520 MHz) signals, the new-generation BeiDou-3 experimental satellites are also capable of transmitting several new navigation signals in space, namely B1C at 1575.42 MHz, B2a at 1176.45 MHz, and B2b at 1207.14 MHz. For the first time, we present an initial characterization and performance assessment for these new-generation BeiDou-3 satellites and their signals. The L1/L2/L5 signals from GPS Block IIF satellites, E1/E5a/E5b signals from Galileo satellites, and B1I/B2I/B3I signals from BeiDou-2 satellites are also evaluated for comparison. The characteristics of the B1C, B1I, B2a, B2b, and B3I signals are evaluated in terms of observed carrier-to-noise density ratio, pseudorange multipath and noise, triple-frequency carrier-phase ionosphere-free and geometry-free combination, and double-differenced carrier-phase and code residuals. The results demonstrate that the observational quality of the new-generation BeiDou-3 signals is comparable to that of GPS L1/L2/L5 and Galileo E1/E5a/E5b signals. However, the analysis of code multipath shows that the elevation-dependent code biases, which have been previously identified to exist in the code observations of the BeiDou-2 satellites, seem to be not obvious for all the available signals of the new-generation BeiDou-3 satellites. This will significantly benefit precise applications that resolve wide-lane ambiguity based on Hatch–Melbourne–Wübbena linear combinations and other applications such as single-frequency precise point positioning (PPP) based on the ionosphere-free code–carrier combinations. Furthermore, with regard to the triple-frequency carrier-phase ionosphere-free and geometry-free combination, it is found that different from the BeiDou-2 and GPS Block IIF satellites, no apparent bias variations could be observed in all the new-generation BeiDou-3 experimental satellites, which shows a good consistency of the new-generation BeiDou-3 signals. The absence of such triple-frequency biases simplifies the potential processing of multi-frequency PPP using observations from the new-generation BeiDou-3 satellites. Finally, the precise relative positioning results indicate that the additional observations from the new-generation BeiDou-3 satellites can improve ambiguity resolution performance with respect to BeiDou-2 only positioning, which indicates that observations from the new-generation BeiDou-3 satellites can contribute to precise relative positioning.     

减小伪卫星多路径效应误差的试验研究

伪卫星定位技术可以补偿GPS系统本身一些先天不足，然而GPS和伪卫星组合进行定位又带来了新的误差源，伪卫星多路径效应就是误差源之一。针对多路径的产生原理及特点，在经典最小二乘理论的基础上，推求稳健最小二乘估计的权函数，并结合实际观测数据验证了稳健最小二乘法消除多路径误差的有效性。     

Multipath mitigation via component analysis methods for GPS dynamic deformation monitoring

Multipath is one of the main error sources in high-precision global positioning system (GPS) dynamic deformation monitoring, as it is difficult to be mitigated by differencing between observations. In addition, since a specific frequency threshold value between multipath and deformation signals may not exist, multipath is usually inseparable from the low-frequency vibration signal using conventional frequency-domain filter methods. However, the multipath repeats in two sidereal days when the surroundings of a GPS antenna remain unchanged. This characteristic can be exploited to model and thus mitigate multipath effectively in dynamic deformation monitoring. Unfortunately, a major issue is that the degree of repeatability decreases as the interval between first day and subsequent days increases. To overcome this problem, we develop a new sidereal filtering referred to as reference EMD-ICA (EMD-ICA-R), where empirical mode decomposition (EMD) and independent component analysis (ICA) are jointly used to model multipath and renew the reference multipath. For the successful implementation of the EMD-ICA-R, an a priori denoised multipath signal is needed as a reference. We further propose to use the principal component analysis (PCA) method to extract more accurate reference multipath signal and form a combined PCA-EMD-ICA-R approach. Simulation experiments with a motion simulation platform were conducted, and the testing results indicate that the proposed methods can mitigate the multipath by around 67 % when a reliable reference multipath signal is extracted from a static situation. Furthermore, simulation experiments with different deformation signals added into the coordinate time series of three consecutive days show that the two proposed methods are also effective in a dynamic situation. Since wavelet filtering is used to denoise the reference multipath signals in the new approaches, simulation experiments with several wavelet filters are tested, and the results indicate that the PCA-EMD-ICA-R approach can work well with various wavelet filters.     

GNSS导航信号的开环补偿多径抑制方法

多径的存在会给全球导航卫星系统的接收机带来较大的定位误差。因此,高精度的接收机须对多径信号进行抑制。针对目前常用的多径抑制方法的优缺点,提出了一种基于多门延迟和曲线拟合的多径抑制方法。该方法通过多门延迟来重塑伪码的自相关函数,用于找到直射信号的伪码真实位置和接收机码跟踪环路鉴别结果之间的偏差,进一步通过曲线拟合方法更加精确地计算出该偏差,最后将该偏差通过开环方法补偿给伪距计算,使得接收机在不改变环路跟踪性能和抗动态干扰性能的前提下实现定位性能的提升。仿真结果表明新算法在前端带宽的影响下对短、中长多径均能进行有效地抑制。      

Spatial–temporal characteristic of BDS phase delays and PPP ambiguity resolution with GEO/IGSO/MEO satellites

GPS precise point positioning (PPP) ambiguity resolution (AR) can improve the positioning accuracy and shorten the convergence time. However, for the BeiDou Satellite Navigation System (BDS), the problems of satellite-induced code bias, imperfections in the error models and the inadequate accuracy of orbit products limit the applications of the BDS PPP AR system, which requires more than 6 h to achieve the first ambiguity-fixed solution. In this study, the accuracy of a wide-lane (WL) uncalibrated phase delay (UPD) is improved after careful consideration of the code bias and multipath. Meanwhile, the accuracy of the BDS float ambiguity is also improved by multi-GNSS fusion and improved precise orbit and clock products, which are critical for high-quality narrow-lane (NL) UPD estimations. With three tracking networks of different scales, including Hong Kong, the Crustal Movement Observation Network of China (CMONOC) and the multi-GNSS experiment (MGEX) networks, the spatial–temporal characteristics of WL and NL UPDs for BDS GEO/IGSO/MEO satellites are analyzed, and the PPP AR is performed. Numerous results show that WL and NL UPDs with a standard deviation (STD) of less than 0.15 cycles can be achieved for BDS GEO satellites, while a STD of less than 0.1 cycles can be obtained for IGSO and MEO satellites. With the precise UPD estimation, for the first time, the BDS PPP rapid ambiguity resolution for GEO/IGSO/MEO satellites is achieved. We found that the average time to first fix (TTFF) of the BDS PPP AR is shortened significantly, to approximately 40 min for Hong Kong and the CMONOC, while the TTFF was 57.4 min for the MGEX networks. With ambiguity resolution, the accuracy of the daily BDS PPP in the east, north and vertical directions improves from 1.74 cm, 1.08 cm, and 5.52 cm to 0.72 cm, 0.54 cm, and 3.21 cm for the Hong Kong network, 2.24 cm, 2.31 cm, and 5.64 cm to 1.18 cm, 0.79 cm, and 3.30 cm for the CMONOC, and 2.71 cm, 1.80 cm, and 6.00 cm to 1.58 cm, 1.15 cm, and 4.33 cm for the MGEX networks. Significant improvement is also achieved for kinematic PPP, with improvements of 40.41%, 34.33% and 37.17% in the east, north and vertical directions for the MGEX networks, respectively.     

北斗三号观测数据质量及定位精度初步评估

开展BDS-3观测数据质量评估对于即将到来的BDS-3应用研究至关重要。本文从载噪比、伪距多路径及观测噪声3方面评估了BDS-3卫星的观测数据质量,在此基础上分析了其标准单点定位和短基线相对定位性能。初步评估结果表明：在载噪比方面,BDS-3卫星的B1I频点比BDS-2卫星高3~4 dB/Hz,B3I频点最高,其余频点大小相当;在多路径方面,BDS-3卫星伪距B2a、B2b和B3I与BDS-2的B3I大小相当,B1I和B1C与BDS-2的B1I、B2I大小相当,且BDS-3各频点的伪距多路径组合中不存在明显的与高度角相关的伪距偏差;在观测值噪声方面,BDS-3卫星与BDS-2卫星各频点大小基本相当。相比于仅使用BDS-2卫星,增加BDS-3卫星可以改善几何图形结构,一定程度上提高伪距单点定位和短基线相对定位的精度。     

联合GEO/IGSO/MEO的北斗PPP模糊度固定方法与试验分析

由于北斗地球静止轨道（geostationary earth orbiting,GEO）卫星轨道精度较低且其观测值受多路径误差和伪距偏差影响严重,目前各分析中心尚未针对北斗GEO卫星提供长期稳定的相位小数偏差（uncalibrated phase delay,UPD）产品,北斗精密单点定位（precise point positioning,PPP）模糊度固定技术研究主要针对倾斜轨道（inclined geosynchronous orbiting,IGSO）和中地球轨道（medium earth orbiting,MEO）卫星。本文采用Wanninger和Beer的高度角模型消除了IGSO/MEO观测值伪距偏差,并通过小波变换提取低频分量修正伪距观测值的方法削弱了GEO卫星多路径和伪距偏差的影响。由于窄巷UPD估值受未模型化误差影响较大,本文改进了窄巷UPD估计的策略,该策略利用上一历元成功估计的窄巷UPD对当前历元的浮点模糊度进行改正,剔除了残差较大的浮点模糊度,修正固定错误的整周模糊度,从而提高了窄巷UPD的精度和稳定性。利用估计得到的UPD产品,本文实现了联合GEO、IGSO和MEO卫星的北斗非差PPP模糊度固定,并对其定位性能进行分析。结果表明：联合GEO、IGSO和MEO卫星的PPP固定解的首次固定时间和收敛时间均可以缩短到30 min以内;6 h后的E、N、U方向的定位误差由（1.35、0.35、2.75）cm减少到（1.07、0.26、2.24）cm,分别减少了20%、27%和18%。     

基于三频SNR数据探测北斗GEO卫星多径效应

多径误差是全球卫星导航系统（global navigation satellite system,GNSS）高精度实时定位的主要误差源。由于多径效应具有时变特性且与观测环境有关,难以有效探测与剔除,尤其是动态定位领域。鉴于多径效应对于同颗卫星不同频率观测值影响不同,本文采用三频信噪比（signal-noise ratio,SNR）频率间差分数据,设计算法探测北斗对地静止卫星（geostationary orbit satellite,GEO）多径误差,并依据开阔环境SNR频间差分数据序列进行统计分析,确定其探测阈值。实验结果表明,北斗GEO卫星易受多径误差影响,传统方法难以实时有效探测,本文提出的新方法可有效探测GEO多径误差,并基于设定的阈值对其数据进行降权或剔除,可应用于GNSS数据质量控制。     

Sidereal filtering based on single differences for mitigating GPS multipath effects on short baselines

Carrier-phase multipath effects are one of the most significant error sources in precise Global Positioning System (GPS) positioning applications. A new sidereal filtering algorithm based on single differences is developed to mitigate multipath effects for short-baseline high-rate GPS applications such as structural deformation monitoring. This method differs from traditional sidereal filtering in that our method operates on the single differences rather than the coordinates or double differences. A multipath model for the single differences on the reference day is established for each satellite and is used to remove multipath errors from observations of subsequent days by taking advantage of the sidereal repeatability of multipath signals. Using both simulated and real GPS observations, we demonstrate that this method is insensitive to different weighting strategies used in computing single differences from double differences. Applying the proposed method can reduce the root mean square (RMS) of positioning noises by 82% on average. Compared to sidereal filtering (in either coordinate or double differences domain) and aspect repeat time adjustment, this method can further reduce the RMS values by 13 and 7%, respectively. Wavelet spectra have shown that the proposed method is more effective in mitigating multipath errors of both long and short periods. This method is also more advantageous in that it is applicable when different GPS satellites are observed on different days.     

GPS multipath mitigation: a nonlinear regression approach

Under the assumption that the surrounding environment remains unchanged, multipath contamination of GPS measurements can be formulated as a function of the sidereal repeatable geometry of the satellite with respect to the fixed receiver. Hence, multipath error estimation amounts to a regression problem. We present a method for estimating code multipath error of GPS ground fixed stations. By formulating the multipath estimation as a regression problem, we construct a nonlinear continuous model for estimating multipath error based on well-known sparse kernel regression, for example, support vector regression. We will empirically show that the proposed method achieves state-of-the-art performance on code multipath mitigation with 79 % reduction on average in terms of standard deviation of multipath error. Furthermore, by simulation, we will also show that the method is robust to other coexisting signals of phenomena, such as seismic signals.     

Identification of GPS positioning solutions deteriorated by signal degradations using a fuzzy inference system

The accuracy of GPS positioning based on pseudorange measurements under signal degradation environments is limited by poor satellite geometry and signal distortions due to diffraction and multipath. As a result, the GPS position solutions could become unreliable. Those deteriorated solutions should be identified and not used for navigation. For that purpose, methods for reliable identification of deteriorated GPS positioning solutions from a navigation receiver should be developed. In this paper, a fuzzy inference system is proposed to classify the quality of GPS positioning solutions. The input for the system includes the signal quality evaluated by the difference between the measured and expected carrier-to-noise density ratio (C/N0) and the satellites geometry strength evaluated by the dilution of precision (DOP) number. The proposed fuzzy inference system is developed based on the human knowledge and understanding of the problem under consideration and is further optimized using data acquired from the field. The test results indicate that the proposed method can be used for reliable identification of deteriorated GPS position solutions affected by signal degradations.     

Estimation and exclusion of multipath range error for robust positioning

In integrated systems for accurate positioning, which consist of GNSS, INS, and other sensors, the GNSS positioning accuracy has a decisive influence on the performance of the entire system and thus is very important. However, GNSS usually exhibits poor positioning results in urban canyon environments due to pseudorange measurement errors caused by multipath creation, which leads to performance degradation of the entire positioning system. For this reason, in order to maintain the accuracy of an integrated positioning system, it is necessary to determine when the GNSS positioning is accurate and which satellites can have their pseudorange measured accurately without multipath errors. Thus, the objective of our work is to detect the multipath errors in the satellite signals and exclude these signals to improve the positioning accuracy of GNSS, especially in an urban canyon environment. One of the previous technologies for tackling this problem is RAIM, which checks the residual of the least square and identifies the suspicious satellites. However, it presumes a Gaussian measurement error that is more common in an open-sky environment than in the urban canyon environment. On the other hand, our proposed method can estimate the size of the pseudorange error directly from the information of altitude positioning error, which is available with an altitude map. This method can estimate even the size of non-Gaussian error due to multipath in the urban canyon environment. Then, the estimated pseudorange error is utilized to weight satellite signals and improve the positioning accuracy. The proposed method was tested with a low-cost GNSS receiver mounted on a test vehicle in a test drive in Nagoya, Japan, which is a typical urban canyon environment. The experimental result shows that the estimated pseudorange error is accurate enough to exclude erroneous satellites and improve the GNSS positioning accuracy.     

基于组合卫星导航系统的编队卫星分析

针对编队飞行中星间相对定位的任务需求,分析了卫星导航系统对编队卫星的动态观测几何问题,引入了相对定位精度衰减因子(RDOP)描述,并讨论了其性质。在对编队中单颗低轨卫星进行导航卫星GDOP分析的基础上,研究了不同编队宽度下编队集合的共视卫星和共视时段,仿真了一定场景下的编队卫星RDOP,并比较了与PDOP的大小关系。接收机的截止高度角对于导航卫星GDOP影响较大;编队宽度会影响到共视卫星的选择;而与采用单个GPS系统相比,采用GPS-Galileo组合卫星导航系统对编队卫星进行相对定位,RDOP数值明显减小,从而有利于高精度的星间位置确定。     

北斗卫星伪距偏差模型估计及其对精密定位的影响

现阶段北斗卫星导航系统（BeiDou navigation satellite system,BDS）的同步地球轨道（geostationary orbits,GEO）卫星、中倾斜地球同步轨道（inclined geo-synchronous orbits,IGSO）卫星和中圆地球轨道（medium earth orbit,MEO）卫星均存在伪距偏差,该伪距偏差的存在对精密定位的研究及其应用产生了较大的影响。根据北斗IGSO和MEO卫星的伪距偏差与高度角和频率相关的误差特性,本文分析了测站数目及分布,以及观测时长对建模的影响,选择18个测站2015年全年的数据作为MEO卫星的建模数据,其中可以连续观测到全弧段IGSO卫星的4个测站用于IGSO卫星的建模,采用加权分段线性拟合联合抗差估计的方法建立了北斗卫星伪距偏差改正模型。模型改正后,北斗IGSO和MEO卫星的伪距偏差得到明显的削弱,相比于传统的伪距偏差改正模型,精密单点定位（precise point positioning,PPP）的定位精度和收敛时间均得到提升。     

Systematic errors in the Z-geocenter derived using satellite tracking data: a case study from SPOT-4 DORIS data in 1998

Within the scope of the Global Geodetic Observing System, Doppler Orbit Determination and Radiopositioning Integrated by Satellite – as a geodetic technique – can provide precise and continuous monitoring of the geocenter motion related to mass redistribution in the Earth, ocean and atmosphere system. We have reanalyzed 1998 DORIS/SPOT-4 (Satellite pour l’ Observation de la Terre) data that were previously generating inconsistent geocenter positions (?65 cm offset). We show here that this error is due to an incorrect phase center correction provided with the DORIS preprocessed data resulting from a +12 cm offset in the cross-track direction that has been confirmed since. We also conclude that a 1 mm error in the cross-track offset of non-yawing sun-synchronous SPOT satellites will generate a ?6.5 mm error in the derived Z-geocenter. Other non-yawing satellites would also be affected by a similar effect whose amplitude could be easily estimated from the orbit inclination