An ERA5 tropospheric parameters-augmented approach for improving GNSS precise point positioning

Precise Point Positioning(PPP) technology has developed into a potent instrument for geodetic positioning, ionospheric modeling, tropospheric atmospheric parameter detection, and seismic monitoring.As atmospheric reanalysis data products’ accuracy and spatiotemporal resolution have improved recently, it has become important to apply these products to obtain high-accuracy tropospheric delay parameters, like zenith tropospheric delay(ZTD) and tropospheric horizontal gradient. These tropospheric delay parameters can be applied to PPP to reduce the convergence time and to increase the accuracy in the vertical direction of the position. The European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts Reanalysis 5(ERA5) atmospheric reanalysis data is the latest product with a high spatiotemporal resolution released by the European Center for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts(ECMWF). Only a few researches have evaluated the application of ERA5 data to Global Navigation Satellite System(GNSS)PPP. Therefore, this study compared and validated the ZTD products derived from ERA5 data using ZTD values provided by 290 global International GNSS Service(IGS) stations for 2016-2017. The results indicated a stable performance for ZTD, with annual average bias and RMS values of 0.23 cm and 1.09 cm,respectively. Further, GNSS observations for one week in each of the four seasons(spring: DOY 92-98;summer: DOY 199-205;autumn: DOY 275-281;and winter: DOY 22-28) from 34 multi-GNSS experiments(MGEX) stations distributed globally in 2016 were considered to evaluate the performance of ERA5-derived tropospheric delay products in GNSS PPP. The performance of ERA5-enhanced PPP was compared with that of the two standard GNSS PPP schemes(without estimated tropospheric horizontal gradient and with estimated tropospheric horizontal gradient). The results demonstrated that ERA5-enhanced GNSS PPP showed no significant improvement in the convergence times in both the Eastern(E) and Northern(N) directions, while the average convergence time over four weeks in the vertical(U)direction improved by 53.3% and 52.7%, respectively(in the case of pngm station). The average convergence times for each week in the U direction of the northern and southern hemisphere stations indicated a decrease of 16.3%, 12.6%, 9.6%, and 9.1%, and 16.9%, 9.6%, 8.9%, and 14.5%, respectively.Regarding positioning accuracy, ERA5-enhanced PPP showed an improvement of 13.3% and 16.2% over the two standard PPP schemes in the U direction, respectively. No significant improvement in the positioning performance was observed in both the E and N directions. Thus, this study demonstrated the potential application of the ERA5 tropospheric parameters-augmented approach to Beidou navigation and positioning.

Performance analysis of real-time and post-mission kinematic precise point positioning in marine environments

This article focuses on the performance analysis of both real-time and post-mission kinematic precise point positioning(PPP)in challenging marine environments.For this purpose,a real dynamic experiment lasting 6 h was carried out on a lake dam in?orum City of Turkey.While the kinematic test was continuing,the real-time PPP coordinates were obtained for each measurement epoch with a commercial real-time PPP(RT-PPP)service,namely the Trimble Center Point RTX.Then the post-mission PPP(PM-PPP)coordinates were calculated by using Multi-GNSS data and the Multi-GNSS Experiment(MGEX)precise products.The kinematic RT-PPP and PM-PPP results showed that the PPP coordinates were consistent with the relative solution at centimetre and decimetre level in horizontal and height components,respectively.This study implies that PPP technique is a powerful tool for highly accurate positioning in both real-time and post-mission modes,even for dynamic applications in harsh environments.

Positioning performance analysis on combined GPS/BDS precise point positioning

Combining the observation data from five Multi-GNSS Experiment(MGEX)stations with the precise orbit and clock products from Global Positioning System(GPS)and BeiDou Navigation Satellite System(BDS),we studied the model of combined GPS/BDS precise point positioning,and then analyzed the convergence speed and short-time(6 h)positioning accuracy.The calculation results show that in static positioning,the average convergence time of GPS is about 50 min,and its horizontal accuracy is better than 2 cm while the vertical accuracy is better than 4 cm.The convergence speed of combined GPS/BDS is about 40 min,and its positioning accuracy is close to that of GPS.In kinematic positioning,the average convergence time of GPS is about 72 min,and its horizontal accuracy is better than 5 cm while the vertical accuracy is better than 12 cm.The average convergence time of GPS/BDS is about 57 min,and its horizontal accuracy is better than 3 cm while the vertical accuracy is better than 9 cm.Combined GPS/BDS has significantly improved the convergence speed,and its positioning accuracy is slightly than that of GPS.

Precise point positioning and its application in mining deformation monitoring

Precise point positioning (PPP)-based deformation monitoring scheme is presented for the use in mining deformation monitoring. Within the solutions of daily observation, outliers are detected and removed to avoid any potential misinterpretation of the results and then the deformation can be extracted by the coordinate differences between the two consecutive solutions. Meanwhile, because of the special location of a rover station in mining areas, the satellite geometry may be insufficient for a reasonable PPP solution, and the multipath impact an also be significant. Therefore, it is necessary to predict the satellite geometry before any daily observation. To evaluate the ability of extracting the deformation using the PPP-based method, various quality measures were introduced. The results of three datasets of the same station show that the precision of deformation monitored by PPP can reach up to cm level and even mm level.

Estimation of annual variation of water vapor in the Arctic Ocean between 80°–87°N using shipborne GPS data based on kinematic precise point positioning

The measurement of atmospheric water vapor （WV） content and variability is important for meteorological and climatological research. A technique for the remote sensing of atmospheric WV content using ground-based Global Positioning System （GPS） has become available, which can routinely achieve accuracies for integrated WV content of 1-2 kg/m2. Some experimental work has shown that the accuracy of WV measurements from a moving platform is comparable to that of （static） land-based receivers. Extending this technique into the marine environment on a moving platform would be greatly beneficial for many aspects of meteorological research, such as the calibration of satellite data, investigation of the air-sea interface, as well as forecasting and climatological studies. In this study, kinematic precise point positioning has been developed to investigate WV in the Arctic Ocean （80°-87°N） and annual variations are obtained for 2008 and 2012 that are identical to those related to the enhanced greenhouse effect.

Signal quality analysis and quality check of BDS3 Precise Point Positioning in the Arctic Ocean

This study analyzes the signal quality and the accuracy of BeiDou 3 rd generation Satellite Navigation System(BDS3) Precise Point Positioning(PPP) in the Arctic Ocean. Assessment of signal quality of BDS3 includes signal to noise ratio(SNR), multipath(MP), dilution of precision(DOP), and code-minus-carrier combination(CC). The results show that, 5 to 13 satellites are visible at any time in the Arctic Ocean area as of September 2018, which are sufficient for positioning. In the mid-latitude oceanic region and in the Arctic Ocean, the SNR is 25–52 dB Hz and the MP ranges from-2 m to 2 m. As the latitude increases, the DOP values show large variation, which may be related to the distribution of BDS satellites. The CC values of signals B1 I and BIC range from-5 m to 5 m in the mid-latitude sea area and the Arctic Ocean, which means the effect of pseudorange noise is small. Moreover, as to obtain the external precise reference value for GNSS positioning in the Arctic Ocean region is difficult, it is hard to evaluate the accuracy of positioning results. An improved isotropy-based protection level method based on Receiver Autonomous Integrity Monitoring is proposed in the paper, which adopts median filter to smooth the gross errors to assess the precision and reliability of PPP in the Arctic Ocean. At first, the improved algorithm is verified with the data from the International GNSS Service Station Tixi. Then the accuracy of BDS3 PPP in the Arctic Ocean is calculated based on the improved algorithm. Which shows that the kinematic accuracy of PPP can reach the decimeter level in both the horizontal and vertical directions, and it meets the precision requirements of maritime navigation.

Comparison of availability and reliability among different combined-GNSS/RNSS precise point positioning

With emergence of the BeiDou Navigation Satellite System(BDS), the Galileo Satellite Navigation System(Galileo), the Quasi-Zenith Satellite System(QZSS)and the restoration of the Global Navigation Satellite System(GLONASS), the single Global Positioning System(GPS) has been gradually expanded into multiple global and regional navigation satellite systems(multi-GNSS/RNSS). In view of differences in these 5 systems, a consolidated multi-GNSS/RNSS precise point positioning(PPP) observation model is deduced in this contribution. In addition, the performance evaluation of PPP for multi-GNSS/RNSS is conducted using a large number of the multi-GNSS experiment(MGEX) station datasets. Experimental results show that multi-GNSS/RNSS can guarantee plenty of visible satellites effectively. Compared with single-system GPS, PDOP, HDOP, and VDOP values of the multi-GNSS/RNSS are improved by 46.8%, 46.5% and 46.3%, respectively. As for convergence time, the static and kinematic PPP of multi-GNSS/RNSS are superior to that of the single-system GPS, whose reliability, availability, and stability drop sharply with the increasing elevation cutoff. At satellite elevation cutoff of 40 °, the single-system GPS fails to carry out continuous positioning because of the insufficient visible satellites, while the multi-GNSS/RNSS PPP can still get positioning solutions with relatively high accuracy, especially in the horizontal direction.

On ionosphere-delay processing methods for single-frequency precise-point positioning

In single-frequency precise-point positioning of a satellite,ionosphere delay is one of the most important factors impacting the accuracy. Because of the instability of the ionosphere and uncertainty of its physical properties, the positioning accuracy is seriously limited when using a precision-limited model for correction. In order to reduce the error, we propose to introduce some ionosphere parameter for real-time ionosphere-delay estimation by applying various mapping functions. Through calculation with data from the IGS（ International GPS Service） tracking station and comparison among results of using several different models and mapping functions, the feasibility and effectiveness of the new method are verified.

Impact of Tropospheric Delay Gradients on Total Tropospheric Delay and Precise Point Positioning

GPS signals are electromagnetic waves that are affected by the Earth’s atmosphere. The Earth’s atmosphere can be categorized, according to its effect on GPS signals, into the ionosphere (ionospheric delay) and neutral atmosphere (tropospheric delay). The first-order ionospheric delay can be eliminated by linear combination of GPS observables on different frequencies. However, tropospheric delay cannot be eliminated because it is frequency-independent. The total tropospheric delay can be divided into three components. The first is the dry component, the second part is the wet component, and the third part is the horizontal gradients which account for the azimuthal dependence of tropospheric delay. In this paper, the effect of modeling tropospheric gradients on the estimation of the total tropospheric delay and station position is investigated. Long session, one month during January 2015, of GPS data is collected from ten randomly selected globally distributed IGS stations. Two cases are studied: the first case, the coordinates of stations are kept fixed to their actual values and the tropospheric delay is estimated twice, with and without tropospheric gradients. In the second case, the station position is estimated along with the total tropospheric delay with and without tropospheric gradients. It is shown that the average bias of the estimated total tropospheric delay when neglecting tropospheric gradients ranges from ?1.72 mm to 2.14 mm while the average bias when estimating gradients are ?0.898 mm to 1.92 mm which means that the bias is reduced by about 30%. In addition, the average standard deviation of the bias is 4.26 mm compared with 4.52 mm which means that the standard deviation is improved by about 6%.

Endemic error correction model and quantitative analysis of precise point positioning

To identify the endemic error of the precise point positioning which cannot be weakened or eliminated in precise point positioning (PPP) zero-difference model, the 24 h observation data acquired from CHAN station on Oct 31st, 2010, were adopted for analyses, different correction models of various errors were discussed and their influences on traditional zero-difference model were analyzed. The results show that the errors cannot be ignored. They must be corrected with suitable models and estimated with auxiliary parameters. The influence magnitudes of all errors are defined, and the results have guiding significance to improve the accuracy of precise point positioning zero-difference model.

Application of precise point positioning technology in airborne gravity measurement

The precise point positioning （PPP） technology is applied to an airborne gravity survey. By analyzing the advantages and disadvantages of several velocity and acceleration measurement methods and in combination with an actual marine gravity survey, the position difference method is confirmed to be a useful survey method for velocity and acceleration. Finally, the practicability of using PPP in airborne marine gravity survey is verified by measured data.

Modeling and Prediction of Inter-System Bias for GPS/BDS-2/BDS-3 Combined Precision Point Positioning

The combination of Precision Point Positioning(PPP)with Multi-Global Navigation Satellite System(MultiGNSS),called MGPPP,can improve the positioning precision and shorten the convergence time more effectively than the combination of PPP with only the BeiDou Navigation Satellite System(BDS).However,the Inter-System Bias(ISB)measurement of Multi-GNSS,including the time system offset,the coordinate system difference,and the inter-system hardware delay bias,must be considered for Multi-GNSS data fusion processing.The detected ISB can be well modeled and predicted by using a quadratic model(QM),an autoregressive integrated moving average model(ARIMA),as well as the sliding window strategy(SW).In this study,the experimental results indicate that there is no apparent difference in the ISB between BDS-2 and BDS-3 observations if B1I/B3I signals are used.However,an obvious difference in ISB can be found between BDS-2 and BDS-3 observations if B1I/B3I and B1C/B2a signals are used.Meanwhile,the precision of the Predicted ISB(PISB)on the next day of all stations is about 0.1−0.6 ns.Besides,to effectively utilize the PISB,a new strategy for predicting the PISB for MGPPP is proposed.In the proposed strategy,the PISB is used by adding two virtual observation equations,and an adaptive factor is adopted to balance the contribution of the Observed ISB(OISB)and the PISB to the final estimations of ISB.To validate the effectiveness of the proposed method,some experimental schemes are designed and tested under different satellite availability conditions.The results indicate that in open sky environment,the selective utilization of the PISB achieves almost the same positioning precision of MGPPP as the direct utilization of the PISB,but the convergence time of MGPPP is reduced by 7.1%at most in the north(N),east(E),and up(U)components.In the blocked sky environment,the selective utilization of the PISB contributes to more significant improvement of the positioning precision and convergence time than that in the open sky environment.Compared with the direct utilization of the PISB,the selective utilization of the PISB improves the positioning precision and convergence time by 6.7%and 12.7%at most in the N,E,and U components,respectively.

Real-time GNSS precise point positioning with smartphones for vehicle navigation

The availability of raw Global Navigation Satellite System(GNSS)measurements from Android smart devices gives new possibilities for precise positioning solutions,e.g.,Precise Point Positioning(PPP).However,the accuracy of the PPP with smart devices currently is a few meters due to the poor quality of the raw GNSS measurements in a kinematic scenario and in urban environments,particularly when the smart devices are placed inside vehicles.To promote the application of GNSS PPP for land vehicle navigation with smart devices,this contribution studies the real-time PPP with smartphones.For data quality analysis and positioning performance validation,two vehicle-based kinematic positioning tests were carried out using two Huawei Mate30 smartphones and two Huawei P40 smartphones with different installation modes:the vehicle-roof mode with smartphones mounted on the top roof outside the vehicle,and the dashboard mode with smartphones stabilized on the dashboard inside the vehicle.To realize high accuracy positioning,we proposed a real-time smartphone PPP method with the data processing strategies adapted for smart devices.Positioning results show that the real-time PPP can achieve the horizontal positioning accuracy of about 1–1.5 m in terms of root-mean-square and better than 2.5 m at the 95th percentile for the vehicle-based kinematic positioning with the experimental smartphones mounted on the dashboard inside the vehicle,which is the real scenario in vehicle navigation.

GNSS rapid precise point positioning enhanced by low Earth orbit satellites

The Low Earth Orbit(LEO)satellites can be used to efectively speed up Precise Point Positioning(PPP)convergence.In this study,180 LEO satellites with a global distribution are simulated to evaluate their contribution to the PPP convergence.LEO satellites can give more redundant observations and improve satellite geometric distributions,particularly for a single Global Navigation Satellite System(GNSS).The convergence speed of the PPP foat solution using the Global Positioning System(GPS,G)or BeiDou Navigation Satellite System(BDS,C)single system as well as the G/C/Galileo navigation satellite system(Galileo,E)/GLObal NAvigation Satellite System(GLONASS,R)combined system with LEO satellites added is improved by 90.0%,91.0%,and 90.7%,respectively,with respect to the system without LEO satellites added.We introduced LEO observations to assist GNSS in PPP-AR(Ambiguity Resolution)and PPP-RTK(Real Time Kinematic).The success fx rate of a single system is signifcantly improved,and the Time-To-First-Fix(TTFF)of G and G/C/E is reduced by 86.4%and 82.8%,respectively,for the PPP-AR solution.We analyzed the positioning performance of LEO satellite assisted G/C/E PPP-RTK in the reference networks of diferent scales,namely diferent atmospheric delay interpolation accuracies.The success fx rate of the G/C/E combined system is improved from 86.8 to 94.9%,and the TTFF is reduced by 36.8%,with the addition of LEO satellites in the 57 km reference network.In the 110 km reference network,the success fx rate of the G/C/E combined system is improved from 64.0 to 88.6%,and the TTFF is reduced by 32.1%.GNSS PPP-RTK with adding the LEO satellites in the reference networks of diferent scales shows obvious improvement because the atmospheric correlation decreases with increasing distance from the reference networks.

Efficient Harmonic Analysis Technique for Prediction of IGS Real-Time Satellite Clock Corrections

Real-time satellite orbit and clock corrections obtained from the broadcast ephemerides can be improved using IGS real-time service (RTS) products. Recent research showed that applying such corrections for broadcast ephemerides can significantly improve the RMS of the estimated coordinates. However, unintentional streaming interruption may happen for many reasons such as software or hardware failure. Streaming interruption, if happened, will cause sudden degradation of the obtained solution if only the broadcast ephemerides are used. A better solution can be obtained in real-time if the predicted part of the ultra-rapid products is used. In this paper, Harmonic analysis technique is used to predict the IGS RTS corrections using historical broadcasted data. It is shown that using the predicted clock corrections improves the RMS of the estimated coordinates by about 72%, 58%, and 72% in latitude, longitude, and height directions, respectively and reduces the 2D and 3D errors by about 80% compared with the predicted part of the IGS ultra-rapid clock corrections.

实时PPP离岸潮位遥测方法与试验

为降低离岸潮位实时遥测成本,提高适用性,提出了基于实时精密单点定位的离岸潮位数据获取与提取方法,利用小型浮标搭载具有实时PPP和远程通讯功能的GNSS接收机进行离岸潮位遥测,原始观测数据经粗差剔除、均值化处理、S-G滤波后,较好地剔除了风、浪、流等引起浮标姿态变化所带来的测量误差。研发了相应软硬件,并在天津港外海进行了试验,测试结果优于±8cm,整体中误差为±3.7cm,满足海洋观测规范要求。相较基于压力式传感器加声学通信的现行数据采集方式,该方法具有建设成本较低、观测方式简单、后期维护方便、产业化前景好等特点,可进一步在实际项目中推广使用。

Integrity monitoring of fixed ambiguity Precise Point Positioning(PPP)solutions

Traditional positioning methods,such as conventional Real Time Kinematic(cRTK)rely upon local reference networks to enable users to achieve high-accuracy positioning.The need for such relatively dense networks has significant cost implications.Precise Point Positioning(PPP)on the other hand is a positioning method capable of centimeter-level positioning without the need for such local networks,hence providing significant cost benefits especially in remote areas.This paper presents the state-of-the-art PPP method using both GPS and GLONASS measurements to estimate the float position solution before attempting to resolve GPS integer ambiguities.Integrity monitoring is carried out using the Imperial College Carrier-phase Receiver Autonomous Integrity Monitoring method.A new method to detect and exclude GPS base-satellite failures is developed.A base-satellite is a satellite whose measurements are differenced from other satellite’s measurements when using between-satellite-differenced measurements to estimate position.The failure detection and exclusion methods are tested using static GNSS data recorded by International GNSS Service stations both in static and dynamic processing modes.The results show that failure detection can be achieved in all cases tested and failure exclusion can be achieved for static cases.In the kinematic processing cases,failure exclusion is more difficult because the higher noise in the measurement residuals increases the difficulty to distinguish between failures associated with the base-satellite and other satellites.

A resilient adjustment method to weigh pseudorange observation in precise point positioning

The accurate weighting of pseudorange observations is important to improve the convergence time and positioning quality of Precise Point Positioning(PPP).Currently,the weight of a pseudorange observation is mainly determined with empirical stochastic models.However,in a complex environment,due to the inability to adapt for the dynamic changes of the user environment,the empirical stochastic models usually cannot reflect the real error level of pseudorange observations.To address this problem,a resilient adjustment method to weigh pseudorange observations is proposed,which constructs the real-time estimation and inflation model for the variance of pseudorange multipath error and measurement noise to replace the empirical stochastic model to determine the weights of pseudorange observations.A set of static and dynamic Global Positioning System(GPS)test data are used to verify the effectiveness of the proposed method.The test results indicate that the proposed real-time estimation model can provide a better representation of the pseudorange accuracy,and the positioning performance of PPP using the real-time estimation model is better than that with the empirical stochastic model.Compared with the optimal empirical stochastic model,the positioning accuracy of PPP with the real-time estimation model is improved by at least 20%,and the convergence time is reduced by at least 50%.

Functional model modification of precise point positioning considering the time-varying code biases of a receiver

Precise Point Positioning(PPP),initially developed for the analysis of the Global Positing System(GPS)data from a large geodetic network,gradually becomes an effective tool for positioning,timing,remote sensing of atmospheric water vapor,and monitoring of Earth’s ionospheric Total Electron Content(TEC).The previous studies implicitly assumed that the receiver code biases stay constant over time in formulating the functional model of PPP.In this contribution,it is shown this assumption is not always valid and can lead to the degradation of PPP performance,especially for Slant TEC(STEC)retrieval and timing.For this reason,the PPP functional model is modified by taking into account the time-varying receiver code biases of the two frequencies.It is different from the Modified Carrier-to-Code Leveling(MCCL)method which can only obtain the variations of Receiver Differential Code Biases(RDCBs),i.e.,the difference between the two frequencies’code biases.In the Modified PPP(MPPP)model,the temporal variations of the receiver code biases become estimable and their adverse impacts on PPP parameters,such as ambiguity parameters,receiver clock offsets,and ionospheric delays,are mitigated.This is confirmed by undertaking numerical tests based on the real dual-frequency GPS data from a set of global continuously operating reference stations.The results imply that the variations of receiver code biases exhibit a correlation with the ambient temperature.With the modified functional model,an improvement by 42%to 96%is achieved in the Differences of STEC(DSTEC)compared to the original PPP model with regard to the reference values of those derived from the Geometry-Free(GF)carrier phase observations.The medium and long term(1×10^(4) to 1.5×10^(4) s)frequency stability of receiver clocks are also signifi-cantly improved.

Vulnerabilities and integrity of precise point positioning for intelligent transport systems:overview and analysis

The implementation of Intelligent Transport System (ITS) technology is expected to significantly improve road safety and traffic efficiency. One of the key components of ITS is precise vehicle positioning. Positioning with decimetre to sub-metre accuracy is a fundamental capability for self-driving, and other automated applications. Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) Precise Point Positioning (PPP) is an attractive positioning approach for ITS due to its relatively low-cost and flexibility. However, GNSS PPP is vulnerable to several effects, especially those caused by the challenging urban environments, where the ITS technology is most likely needed. To meet the high integrity requirements of ITS applications, it is necessary to carefully analyse potential faults and failures of PPP and to study relevant integrity monitoring methods. In this paper an overview of vulnerabilities of GNSS PPP is presented to identify the faults that need to be monitored when developing PPP integrity monitoring methods. These vulnerabilities are categorised into different groups according to their impact and error sources to assist integrity fault analysis, which is demonstrated with Failure Modes and Effects Analysis (FMEA) and Fault Tree Analysis (FTA) methods. The main vulnerabilities are discussed in detail, along with their causes, characteristics, impact on users, and related mitigation methods. In addition, research on integrity monitoring methods used for accounting for the threats and faults in PPP for ITS applications is briefly reviewed. Both system-level (network-end) and user-level (user-end) integrity monitoring approaches for PPP are briefly discussed, focusing on their development and the challenges in urban scenarios. Some open issues, on which further efforts should focus, are also identified.