Monitoring the ionosphere based on the Crustal Movement Observation Network of China

The Global Navigation Satellite System （GNSS） is becoming important for monitoring the variations in the earth＇s ionosphere based on the total electron content （TEC） and iono- spheric electron density （IED）. The Crustal Movement Observation Network of China （CMONOC）, which includes GNSS stations across China's Mainland, enables the continuous monitoring of the ionosphere over China as accurately as possible. A series of approaches for GNSS-based ionospheric remote sensing and software has been proposed and devel- oped by the Institute of Geodesy and Geophysics （IGG） in Wuhan. Related achievements include the retrieval of ionospheric observables from raw GNSS data, differential code biases estimations in satellites and receivers, models of local and regional ionospheric TEC, and algorithms of ionospheric tomography. Based on these achievements, a software for processing GNSS data to determine the variations in ionospheric TEC and IED over China has been designed and developed by IGG. This software has also been installed at the CMONOC data centers belonging to the China Earthquake Administration and China Meteorological Administration. This paper briefly introduces the related research achievements and indicates potential directions of future work.

Carrier phase-based ionospheric observables using PPP models

The ionosphere is one of the major error sources in Global Navigation Satellite System （GNSS） posi- tioning, navigation and timing. Estimating the ionospheric delays precisely is of great interest in the GNSS community. To date, GNSS observables for ionospheric estimation are most commonly based on carrier phase smoothed code measurements. However, leveling errors, which affect the performance of ionospheric modeling and differential code bias （DCB） estimation, exist in the carrier phase smoothed code observations. Such leveling errors are caused by the multipath and the short-term variation of DCB. To reduce these leveling errors, this paper investigates and estimates the ionospheric delays based on carrier phase measurements without the leveling errors. The line-of-sight ionospheric observables with high precision are calculated using precise point positioning （PPP） techniques, in which carrier phase measurements are the principal observables. Ionosphere-free and UofC PPP models are applied and compared for their effectiveness to minimize the leveling errors. To assess the leveling errors, single difference of ionospheric observables for a short baseline is examined. Results show that carrier phase- derived ionospheric observables from PPP techniques can effectively reduce the leveling errors. Furthermore, we compared the PPP ionosphere estimation model with the conventional carrier phase smoothed code method to assess the bias consistency and investigate the biases in the ionospheric observables.

Estimation of BDS pseudorange biases with high temporal resolution:feasibility,affecting factors,and necessity

A common practice adopted for the pseudorange bias estimation and calibration assumes that Global Navigation Satellite System satellite-dependent pseudorange biases vary gently over time.Whereupon satellite pseudorange biases are routinely estimated and provided as the products with low temporal resolution,e.g.,hourly or daily,by the agencies.The story sounds unquestionably perfect under the acquainted assumption.To validate the inadequacy of the above hypothesis we herein present an approach to the estimate the BeiDou Navigation Satellite System(BDS)pseudorange biases with high temporal resolution.Its feasibility,affecting factors,and necessity are discussed.Concretely,the Geometry-Free function models are first constructed to retrieve the linear combination of the pseudorange biases;then the pseudorange Observable-specific Signal Bias(OSB)values with respect to baseline frequencies(e.g.,BDS C2I/C6I)are estimated along with the ionosphere modeling;subsequently,all multi-frequency pseudorange OSBs are determined by using the ionospheric information with constraint conditions;finally,the possible Differential Code Bias sets are attainable with the estimated pseudorange OSBs.Using the observation data of four months when the estimated BDS pseudorange biases are stable,their reliability is demonstrated with the stability at the level of sub-nanosecond and the BeiDou-3 Navigation Satellite System(BDS-3)values more stable than that of BeiDou-2 Navigation Satellite System(BDS-2).The comparison between the estimated pseudorange biases and the Chinese Academy of Sciences products reveals that the accuracy of the estimated pseudorange biases is 0.2–0.4 ns.Moreover,the large magnitude of the short-term pseudorange bias variation in the tens of nanoseconds for the BDS-2 and BDS-3 are found in years 2021 and 2022,which are affected by two types of the satellite flex power for the BDS-2 and BDS-3,respectively.We stress that it’s necessary to estimate the BDS pseudorange biases with high temporal resolution in the case of the satellite flex power and the products currently provided by the agencies cannot reflect the true quantity under the circumstance.