Orbit and clock products for quad-system satellites with undifferenced ambiguity fixing approach

Integer Ambiguity Resolution(IAR)can significantly improve the accuracy of GNSS Precise Orbit Determination(POD).Traditionally,the IAR in POD is achieved at the Double Differenced(DD)level.In this contribution,we develop an Un-Differenced(UD)IAR method for Global Positioning System(GPS)+BeiDou Navigation Satellite System(BDS)+Galileo navigation satellite system(Galileo)+Global'naya Navigatsionnaya Sputnikovaya Sistema(GLONASS)quad-system POD by calibrating UD ambiguities in the raw carrier phase and generating the so-called carrier range.Based on this method,we generate the UD ambiguity-fixed orbit and clock products for the Wuhan Innovation Application Center(IAC)of the International GNSS Monitoring and Assessment System(iGMAS).One-year observations in 2020 from 150 stations are employed to investigate performance of orbit and clock products.Notably,the UD Ambiguity Resolution(AR)yields more resolved integer ambiguities than the traditional DD AR,scaling up to 9%,attributable to its avoidance of station baseline formation.Benefiting from the removal of ambiguity parameters,the computational efficiency of parameter estimation undergoes a substantial 70%improvement.Compared with the float solution,the orbit consistencies of UD AR solution achieve the accuracy of 1.9,5.2,2.8,2.1,and 2.7 cm for GPS,BeiDou-2 Navigation Satellite System(BDS-2),BeiDou-3 Navigation Satellite System(BDS-3),Galileo,and GLONASS satellites respectively,reflecting enhancements of 40%,24%,54%,34%,and 42%.Moreover,the standard deviations of Satellite Laser Ranging(SLR)residuals are spanning 2.5–3.5 cm,underscoring a comparable accuracy to the DD AR solution,with discrepancies below 5%.A notable advantage of UD AR lies in its capability to produce the Integer Recovered Clock(IRC),facilitating Precise Point Positioning(PPP)AR without requiring additional Uncalibrated Phase Delay(UPD)products.To assess the performance of quad-system kinematic PPP based on IRC,a network comprising 120 stations is utilized.In comparison to the float solution,the IRC-based PPP AR accelerates convergence time by 31%and enhance positioning accuracy in the east component by 54%.

Review of PPP-RTK:achievements,challenges,and opportunities

The PPP–RTK method,which combines the concepts of Precise of Point Positioning(PPP)and Real-Time Kinematic(RTK),is proposed to provide a centimeter-accuracy positioning service for an unlimited number of users.Recently,the PPP–RTK technique is becoming a promising tool for emerging applications such as autonomous vehicles and unmanned logistics as it has several advantages including high precision,full flexibility,and good privacy.This paper gives a detailed review of PPP–RTK focusing on its implementation methods,recent achievements as well as challenges and opportunities.Firstly,the fundamental approach to implement PPP–RTK is described and an overview of the research on key techniques,such as Uncalibrated Phase Delay(UPD)estimation,precise atmospheric correction retrieval and modeling,and fast PPP ambiguity resolution,is given.Then,the recent efforts and progress are addressed,such as improving the performance of PPP–RTK by combining multi-GNSS and multi-frequency observations,single-frequency PPP–RTK for low-cost devices,and PPP–RTK for vehicle navigation.Also,the system construction and applications based on the PPP–RTK method are summarized.Moreover,the main issues that impact PPP–RTK performance are highlighted,including signal occlusion in complex urban areas and atmosphere modeling in extreme weather events.The new opportunities brought by the rapid development of low-cost markets,multiple sensors,and new-generation Low Earth Orbit(LEO)navigation constellation are also discussed.Finally,the paper concludes with some comments and the prospects for future research.

Principle and performance of multi-frequency and multi-GNSS PPP-RTK

PPP-RTK which takes full advantages of both Real-Time Kinematic(RTK)and Precise Point Positioning(PPP),is able to provide centimeter-level positioning accuracy with rapid integer Ambiguity Resolution(AR).In recent years,with the development of BeiDou Navigation Satellite System(BDS)and Galileo navigation satellite system(Galileo)as well as the modernization of Global Positioning System(GPS)and GLObal NAvigation Satellite System(GLONASS),more than 140 Global Navigation Satellite System(GNSS)satellites are available.Particularly,the new-generation GNSS satellites are capable of transmitting signals on three or more frequencies.Multi-GNSS and multi-frequency observations become available and can be used to enhance the performance of PPP-RTK.In this contribution,we develop a multi-GNSS and multi-frequency PPP-RTK model,which uses all the available GNSS observations,and comprehensively evaluate its performance in urban environments from the perspectives of positioning accuracy,convergence and fxing percentage.In this method,the precise atmospheric corrections are derived from the multi-frequency and multi-GNSS observations of a regional network,and then disseminated to users to achieve PPP rapid AR.Furthermore,a cascade ambiguity fxing strategy using Extra‐Wide‐Lane(EWL),Wide-Lane(WL)and L1 ambiguities is employed to improve the performance of ambiguity fxing in the urban environments.Vehicle experiments in diferent scenarios such as suburbs,overpasses,and tunnels are conducted to validate the proposed method.In suburbs,an accuracy of within 2 cm in the horizontal direction and 4 cm in the vertical direction,with the fxing percentage of 93.7%can be achieved.Compared to the GPS-only solution,the positioning accuracy is improved by 87.6%.In urban environments where signals are interrupted frequently,a fast ambiguity re-fxing can be achieved within 5 s.Moreover,multifrequency GNSS signals can further improve the positioning performance of PPP-RTK,particularly in the case of small amount of observations.These results demonstrate that the multi-frequency and multi-GNSS PPP-RTK is a promising tool for supporting precise vehicle navigation.