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Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System
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Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System

A special issue of Remote Sensing (ISSN 2072-4292).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 October 2019) | Viewed by 100101

Special Issue Editors

Prof. Dr. Jianghui Geng

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
GNSS Research Center, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430079, China
Interests: high-precision GNSS positioning; undifferenced ambiguity resolution; GNSS seismology; earthquake and tsunami early warning
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Prof. Dr. Maorong Ge

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
German Research Centre for Geosciences (GFZ), Telegrafenberg, 14473 Potsdam, Germany
Interests: GNSS positioning and navigation; precise orbit determination; multi-sensor fusion; GNSS remote sensing
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Jennifer Haase

E-Mail
Guest Editor
Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California San Diego, 9500 Gilman Dr, La Jolla, CA 92093-0225, USA
Interests: GNSS meteorology; GNSS seismology; seismogeodesy; tectonics
Prof. Dr. Weiping Jiang

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
GNSS Research Center, Wuhan University, 129 Luoyu Road, Wuhan 430079, China
Interests: satellite geodesy; satellite altimetry; global navigation satellite system (GNSS); BDS precise positioning; deformation monitoring; time series analysis; terrestrial reference frame
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

In the last few decades, we have seen the great progress of GNSS, which is originally not designed for earth observation, but now provides crucial opportunities in a broad scope of earth science processes. For one thing, the advancements in multi-GNSS, including GPS, GLONASS, BeiDou, Galileo, and QZSS continually improve the precision and accuracy of GNSS positioning; for another, high-quality positioning solutions makes GNSS ideal for studying geohazards and many types of geophysical phenomena, such as the movement of tectonic plates, volcano inflation and deflation, and smaller-scale phenomena such as landslides. Many countries and regions have funded a large number of projects to establish GNSS stations and networks, such as the American Plate Boundary Observatory, the Japanese GNSS Earth Observation Network System, and the Crustal Movement Observation Network of China. These projects have produced very abundant GNSS data for earth observation. As a result, new problems and challenges in GNSS algorithms, data processing, geophysical applications, and scientific interpretations will arise.

In this Special Issue, we invite original research and case studies focusing on recent developments in GNSS theories and algorithms and GNSS earth science applications. We encourage submissions that may include but are not limited to:

  • High-precision GNSS and relevant algorithms
  • New methods and relevant challenging issues for retrieving troposphere and ionosphere delays
  • Co-/inter-/post-seismic crustal deformation, slow-deformation, and slip models of large earthquakes from GNSS or with other types of data (leveling data, InSAR, GRACE, etc.)
  • Volcano, subsidence and landslide monitoring using GNSS
  • GNSS meteorology and its implications for large-scale climate phenomena, such as ESNO and East Asian Monsoon
  • Terrestrial-water-storage variation from GNSS and its effect on global sea-level change
  • GNSS reflectometry for ocean and land applications
  • Earthquake and tsunami early warning using real-time GNSS
  • Challenging issues and future directions

Papers are welcomed on all of the above aspects, and more.

Dr. Jianghui Geng
Dr. Maorong Ge
Dr. Jennifer Haase
Dr. Weiping Jiang
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Remote Sensing is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2700 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • High-precision GNSS 
  • Crustal deformation 
  • Volcano, subsidence and landslide monitoring 
  • GNSS meteorology
  • Global sea-level change 
  • GNSS reflectometry 
  • Earthquake and tsunami early warning

Published Papers (28 papers)

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20 pages, 14553 KiB  
Article
A Refined SNR Based Stochastic Model to Reduce Site-Dependent Effects
by Ruijie Xi, Xiaolin Meng, Weiping Jiang, Xiangdong An, Qiyi He and Qusen Chen
Remote Sens. 2020, 12(3), 493; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs12030493 - 04 Feb 2020
Cited by 8 | Viewed by 3222
Abstract
Site-dependent effects are now the key factors that restrict the high accuracy applications of Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) technology, such as deformation monitoring. To reduce the effects of non-line-of-sight (NLOS) signal and multipath, methods and models applied to both of the function [...] Read more.
Site-dependent effects are now the key factors that restrict the high accuracy applications of Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) technology, such as deformation monitoring. To reduce the effects of non-line-of-sight (NLOS) signal and multipath, methods and models applied to both of the function model and stochastic model of least-squares (LS) have been proposed. However, the existing methods and models may not be convenient to use and not be appropriate to all GNSS satellites. In this study, the SNR features of GPS and GLONASS are analyzed first, and a refined SNR based stochastic model is proposed, in which the links between carrier phase precision and SNR observation have been reasonably established. Compared with the existing models, the refined model in this paper could be used in real-time and the carrier phase precision could be reasonably shown with the SNR data. More importantly, it is applicable to all GNSS satellite systems. Based on this model, the site observation environment can be assessed in advance to show the obstruction area. With a bridge deformation monitoring platform, the performance of this model was tested in the aspect of integer ambiguity resolution and data processing. The results show that, compared with the existing stochastic models, this model could have the highest integer ambiguity resolution success rate and the lowest noise level in the data processing time series with obvious obstruction beside the site. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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15 pages, 5066 KiB  
Article
Performance Evaluation of Troposphere Estimated from Galileo-Only Multi-Frequency Observations
by Lewen Zhao, Pavel Václavovic and Jan Douša
Remote Sens. 2020, 12(3), 373; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs12030373 - 23 Jan 2020
Cited by 10 | Viewed by 2586
Abstract
The tropospheric delays estimated from the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) have been proven to be an efficient product for monitoring variations of water vapor, which plays an important role in meteorology applications. The operational GNSS water vapor monitoring system is currently based [...] Read more.
The tropospheric delays estimated from the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) have been proven to be an efficient product for monitoring variations of water vapor, which plays an important role in meteorology applications. The operational GNSS water vapor monitoring system is currently based on the Global Positioning System (GPS) and GLObal NAvigation Satellite System(GLONASS) dual-frequency observations. The Galileo satellite navigation system has been evolving continuously, and on 11 February 2019, the constellation reached 22 active satellites, achieving a capability of standalone Precise Point Positioning (PPP) and tropospheric estimation that is global in scope. This enhancement shows a 37% improvement if the precision of the Galileo-only zenith tropospheric delay, while we may anticipate further benefits in terms of tropospheric gradients and slant delays in the future if an optimal multi-constellation and multi-frequency processing strategy is used. First, we analyze the performance of the multi-frequency troposphere estimates based on the PPP raw observation model by comparing it with the standard ionosphere-free model. The performance of the Galileo-only tropospheric solution is then validated with respect to GPS-only solution using 48 globally distributed Multi-GNSS Experiment (MGEX) stations. The averaged bias and standard deviations are −0.3 and 5.8 mm when only using GPS satellites, respectively, and 0.0 and 6.2 mm for Galileo, respectively, when compared to the International GNSS Service (IGS) final Zenith Troposphere Delay(ZTD) products. Using receiver antenna phase center corrections from the corresponding GPS dual-frequency observations does not affect the Galileo PPP ambiguity float troposphere solutions. These results demonstrate a comparable precision achieved for both Galileo-only and GPS-only ZTD solutions, however, horizontal tropospheric gradients, estimated from standalone GPS and Galileo solutions, still show larger discrepancies, mainly due to their being less Galileo satellites than GPS satellites. Including Galileo E1, E5a, E5b, and E5 signals, along with their proper observation weighting, show the benefit of multi-frequency observations, further improving the ZTD precision by 4% when compared to the dual-frequency raw observation model. Overall, the presented results demonstrate good prospects for the application of multi-frequency Galileo observations for the tropospheric parameter estimates. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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18 pages, 7204 KiB  
Article
The Influence of Different Modelling Factors on Global Temperature and Pressure Models and Their Performance in Different Zenith Hydrostatic Delay (ZHD) Models
by Fei Yang, Xiaolin Meng, Jiming Guo, Junbo Shi, Xiangdong An, Qiyi He and Lv Zhou
Remote Sens. 2020, 12(1), 35; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs12010035 - 20 Dec 2019
Cited by 9 | Viewed by 2369
Abstract
Surface temperature and pressure are indispensable variables in Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) meteorology. The lack of meteorological observations located at or near the GNSS sites is a big challenge for the calculation of accurate zenith hydrostatic delay (ZHD). Therefore, various empirical models [...] Read more.
Surface temperature and pressure are indispensable variables in Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) meteorology. The lack of meteorological observations located at or near the GNSS sites is a big challenge for the calculation of accurate zenith hydrostatic delay (ZHD). Therefore, various empirical models with different model forms were established to provide temperature and pressure values. In this study, the influence of different modelling factors, including model forms, temporal resolution of the data sources, and the spatial resolution of the data sources, is evaluated and the temperature and pressure model with the best performance is developed. On the basis of the meteorological parameters estimated by the above model, we analyzed the global performance of the three most commonly used ZHD models, that is, the Saastamoinen, Hopfield, and Black models. The numerical results show that the model with the idea of time-segmented modelling performs best, of which the global mean root mean square (RMS), mean absolute error (MAE), and standard deviation (SD) are 7.87/6.33/7.17 hPa and 2.95/2.31/2.79 K for pressure and temperature, respectively, using the data sources with temporal resolution of 2 h and spatial resolution of 2.5° × 2° in the reanalysis data comparison. In comparison with the radiosonde data, the mean RMS/MAE/SD are 7.02/5.24/6.46 hPa and 4.05/3.17/3.86 K for pressure and temperature, respectively. The Saastamoinen model with a global mean bias/RMS of 1.01/16.9 mm achieved the best ZHD estimated values compared with the other two ZHD models. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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20 pages, 12645 KiB  
Article
Crustal Deformation of Northeastern China Following the 2011 Mw 9.0 Tohoku, Japan Earthquake Estimated from GPS Observations: Strain Heterogeneity and Seismicity
by Guojie Meng, Xiaoning Su, Weiwei Wu, Shestakov Nikolay, Hiroaki Takahashi, Mako Ohzono and Mikhail Gerasimenko
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(24), 3029; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11243029 - 16 Dec 2019
Cited by 8 | Viewed by 3102
Abstract
Using global positioning system (GPS) observations of northeastern China and the southeast of the Russian Far East over the period 2012–2017, we derived an ITRF2014-referenced velocity field by fitting GPS time series with a functional model incorporating yearly and semiannual signals, linear trends, [...] Read more.
Using global positioning system (GPS) observations of northeastern China and the southeast of the Russian Far East over the period 2012–2017, we derived an ITRF2014-referenced velocity field by fitting GPS time series with a functional model incorporating yearly and semiannual signals, linear trends, and offsets. We subsequently rotated the velocity field into a Eurasia-fixed velocity field and analyzed its spatial characteristics. Taking an improved multiscale spherical wavelet algorithm, we computed strain rate tensors and analyzed their spatial distribution at multiple scales. The derived Eurasia-referenced velocity field shows that northeastern China generally moved southeastward. Extensional deformation was identified at the Yilan–Yitong Fault (YYF) and the Dunhua–Mishan Fault (DMF), with negligible strike–slip rates. The principal strain rates were characterized by NE–SW compression and NW–SE extension. The dilation rates show compressional deformation in the southern segment of the YYF, northern end of the Nenjiang Fault (NJF), and southeast of the Russian Far East. We also investigated the impact of the 2011 Tohoku Mw 9.0 earthquake on the crustal deformation of northeastern China, generated by its post-seismic viscoelastic relaxation. The velocities generated by the post-seismic viscoelastic relaxation of the giant earthquake are generally orientated southeast, with magnitudes inversely proportional with the epicentral distances. The principal strain rates caused by the viscoelastic relaxation were also characterized by NW–SE stretching and NE–SW compression. The dilation rates show that compressional deformation appeared in the southern segment of the DMF and the YYF and southeast of the Russian Far East. Significant maximum shear rates were identified around the southern borderland between northeastern China and the southeast of the Russian Far East. Finally, we compared the multiple strain rates and the seismicity of northeastern China after the 2011 Tohoku earthquake. Our finding shows that the ML ≥ 4.0 earthquakes were mostly concentrated around the zones of high areal strain rates and shear rates at scales of 4 and 5, in particular, at the DMF and YYF fault zones. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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16 pages, 1560 KiB  
Article
Impact of ECOM Solar Radiation Pressure Models on Multi-GNSS Ultra-Rapid Orbit Determination
by Yang Liu, Yanxiong Liu, Ziwen Tian, Xiaolei Dai, Yun Qing and Menghao Li
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(24), 3024; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11243024 - 15 Dec 2019
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 2884
Abstract
The Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) ultra-rapid precise orbits are crucial for global and wide-area real-time high-precision applications. The solar radiation pressure (SRP) model is an important factor in precise orbit determination. The real-time orbit determination is generally less accurate than the post-processed [...] Read more.
The Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) ultra-rapid precise orbits are crucial for global and wide-area real-time high-precision applications. The solar radiation pressure (SRP) model is an important factor in precise orbit determination. The real-time orbit determination is generally less accurate than the post-processed one and may amplify the instability and mismodeling of SRP models. Also, the impact of different SRP models on multi-GNSS real-time predicted orbits demands investigations. We analyzed the impact of the ECOM 1 and ECOM 2 models on multi-GNSS ultra-rapid orbit determination in terms of ambiguity resolution performance, real-time predicted orbit overlap precision, and satellite laser ranging (SLR) validation. The multi-GNSS observed orbital arc and predicted orbital arcs of 1, 3, 6, and 24 h are compared. The simulated real-time experiment shows that for GLONASS and Galileo ultra-rapid orbits, compared to ECOM 1, ECOM 2 increased the ambiguity fixing rate to 89.3% and 83.1%, respectively, and improves the predicted orbit accuracy by 9.2% and 27.7%, respectively. For GPS ultra-rapid orbits, ECOM 2 obtains a similar ambiguity fixing rate as ECOM 1 but slightly better orbit overlap precision. For BDS GEO ultra-rapid orbits, ECOM 2 obtains better overlap precision and SLR residuals, while for BDS IGSO and MEO ultra-rapid orbits, ECOM 1 obtains better orbit overlap precision and SLR residuals. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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17 pages, 4503 KiB  
Article
A New Fuzzy-Cluster-Based Cycle-Slip Detection Method for GPS Single-Frequency Observation
by Zongnan Li, Min Li, Chuang Shi, Liang Chen, Chenlong Deng, Weiwei Song, Renli Liu and Peihua Zhang
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(24), 2896; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11242896 - 04 Dec 2019
Cited by 4 | Viewed by 2333
Abstract
The development of low-cost, small, modular receivers and their application in diverse scenarios with complex data quality has increased the requirements of single-frequency carrier-phase data preprocessing in real time. Different methods have been developed, but successful detection is not always ensured. The issue [...] Read more.
The development of low-cost, small, modular receivers and their application in diverse scenarios with complex data quality has increased the requirements of single-frequency carrier-phase data preprocessing in real time. Different methods have been developed, but successful detection is not always ensured. The issue is crucial for high-precision positioning with Global Positioning System (GPS). Aiming at a high detection rate and low false-alarm rate, we propose a new cycle-slip detection method based on fuzzy-cluster. It consists of two steps. The first is identification of the epoch when cycle slips appear using Chi-square test based on time-differenced observations. The second is identification of the satellite which suffers from cycle slips using the fuzzy-cluster algorithm. To verify the performance of the proposed method, we compared it to a current robust method using real single-frequency data with simulated cycle slips. Results indicate that the proposed method outperforms the robust estimation method, with a higher correct-detection rate and lower undetection rate. As the number of satellites simulated with cycle slips increases, the correct-detection rate rapidly decreases from 100% to below 50% with the robust estimation method. While the correct-detection rate using the proposed method is always more than 60%, even if the number of satellites simulated with cycle slips reaches five. In addition, the proposed method always has a lower undetection rate than the robust estimation method. Simulation showed that when the number of satellites with cycle slips exceeds three, the undetection rate increases to more than 30%, reaching ~70% for the robust estimation method and less than 30% for the proposed method. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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16 pages, 2562 KiB  
Article
Estimation of the Antenna Phase Center Correction Model for the BeiDou-3 MEO Satellites
by Xingyuan Yan, Guanwen Huang, Qin Zhang, Le Wang, Zhiwei Qin and Shichao Xie
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(23), 2850; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11232850 - 30 Nov 2019
Cited by 19 | Viewed by 3498
Abstract
Satellite antenna phase center offsets (PCOs) and phase variations (PVs) for BeiDou-3 satellites are estimated based on the tracking data of the Multi-GNSS Experiment (MGEX) and the international GNSS Monitoring and Assessment System (iGMAS) network. However, when estimating the (PCOs) of BeiDou-3 medium [...] Read more.
Satellite antenna phase center offsets (PCOs) and phase variations (PVs) for BeiDou-3 satellites are estimated based on the tracking data of the Multi-GNSS Experiment (MGEX) and the international GNSS Monitoring and Assessment System (iGMAS) network. However, when estimating the (PCOs) of BeiDou-3 medium Earth orbit (MEO) satellites by pure Extending the CODE Orbit Model (ECOM1), the x-offset estimations of the PCOs have a systematic variation of about 0.4 m with the elevation of the Sun above the orbital plane (β-angle). Thus, a priori box-wing solar radiation pressure (SRP) model of BeiDou-3 MEO was assisted with ECOM1. Then, the satellite type-specific PCOs and common PVs were obtained. The estimations of PCOs and PVs were compared with the MGEX PCOs from the precise orbit and clock offset. When the MGEX PCOs were used, the root mean square (RMS) of 24 h overlap was 6.76, 4.36, 1.46 cm, in along-track, cross-track, and radial directions, respectively; the RMS and standard deviations (STD) of the 24 h clock offset overlap were 0.28 and 0.15 ns; the fitting RMS of the 72 h clock offset of the quadratic polynomial was 0.243 ns. After comparing this with the estimated PCOs and PVs, the RMS of the 24 h orbit overlap was decreased by 6.5 mm (10.54%), 1.8 mm (4.4%), and 1.1 mm (8.03%) in the along-track, cross-track, and radial directions, respectively; the RMS and STD of the 24 h clock offset overlap were decreased by 0.024 ns (8.6%) and 0.020 ns (13.1%), respectively; the fitting RMS of the 72 h clock offset of the quadratic polynomial was reduced by about 0.016 ns (6.5%). Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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19 pages, 9270 KiB  
Article
Application of GeoSHM System in Monitoring Extreme Wind Events at the Forth Road Bridge
by Xiaolin Meng, Dinh Tung Nguyen, John S. Owen, Yilin Xie, Panagiotis Psimoulis and George Ye
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(23), 2799; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11232799 - 26 Nov 2019
Cited by 18 | Viewed by 3298
Abstract
Implementation of Structural Health Monitoring systems on long-span bridges has become mandatory in many countries to ascertain the safety of these structures and the public, taking into account an increase in usage and threats due to extreme loading conditions. However, the successful delivery [...] Read more.
Implementation of Structural Health Monitoring systems on long-span bridges has become mandatory in many countries to ascertain the safety of these structures and the public, taking into account an increase in usage and threats due to extreme loading conditions. However, the successful delivery of such a system is facing many challenges including the failure to extract damage and reliability information from monitoring data to assist bridge operators with their maintenance planning and activities. Supported by the European Space Agency under the Integrated Applications Promotion scheme, the project ‘GNSS and Earth Observation for Structural Health Monitoring of Long-span Bridges’ or GeoSHM aims to address some of these shortcomings (GNSS stands for Global Navigation Satellite System). In this paper, the background of the GeoSHM project as well as the GeoSHM sensor system on the Forth Road Bridge (FRB) in Scotland will be briefly described. The bridge response and wind data collected over a two-year period from 15 October 2015 to 15 October 2017 will be analysed to demonstrate the high susceptibility of the bridge to wind loads. Close examination of the data associated with an extreme wind event in 2018—Storm Ali—will be conducted to reveal the relationship between the wind speed and some monitored parameters such as the bridge response and modal frequencies. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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17 pages, 5080 KiB  
Article
Modeling and Assessment of GPS/Galileo/BDS Precise Point Positioning with Ambiguity Resolution
by Xuexi Liu, Hua Chen, Weiping Jiang, Ruijie Xi, Wen Zhao, Chuanfeng Song and Xingyu Zhou
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(22), 2693; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11222693 - 18 Nov 2019
Cited by 7 | Viewed by 2663
Abstract
Multi-frequency and multi-GNSS integration is currently becoming an important trend in the development of satellite navigation and positioning technology. In this paper, GPS/Galileo/BeiDou (BDS) precise point positioning (PPP) with ambiguity resolution (AR) are discussed in detail. The mathematical model of triple-system PPP AR [...] Read more.
Multi-frequency and multi-GNSS integration is currently becoming an important trend in the development of satellite navigation and positioning technology. In this paper, GPS/Galileo/BeiDou (BDS) precise point positioning (PPP) with ambiguity resolution (AR) are discussed in detail. The mathematical model of triple-system PPP AR and the principle of fractional cycle bias (FCB) estimation are firstly described. With the data of 160 stations in Multi-GNSS Experiment (MGEX) from day of year (DOY) 321-350, 2018, the FCBs of the three systems are estimated and the experimental results show that the range of most GPS wide-lane (WL) FCB is within 0.1 cycles during one month, while that of Galileo WL FCB is 0.05 cycles. For BDS FCB, the classification estimation method is used to estimate the BDS FCB and divide it into GEO and non-GEO (IGSO and MEO) FCB. The variation range of BDS GEO WL FCB can reach 0.5 cycles, while BDS non-GEO WL FCB does not exceed 0.1 cycles within a month. However, the accuracies of GPS, Galileo, and BDS non-GEO narrow-lane (NL) FCB are basically the same. In addition, the number of visible satellites and Position Dilution of Precision (PDOP) values of different combined systems are analyzed and evaluated in this paper. It shows that the triple-system combination can significantly increase the number of observable satellites, optimize the spatial distribution structure of satellites, and is significantly superior to the dual-system and single-system. Finally, the positioning characteristics of single-, dual-, and triple-systems are analyzed. The results of the single station positioning experiment show that the accuracy and convergence speed of the fixed solutions for each system are better than those of the corresponding float solutions. The average root mean squares (RMSs) of the float and the fixed solution in the east and north direction for GPS/Galileo/BDS combined system are the smallest, being 0.92 cm, 0.52 cm and 0.50 cm, 0.46 cm respectively, while the accuracy of the GPS in the up direction is the highest, which is 1.44 cm and 1.27 cm, respectively. Therefore, the combined system can accelerate the convergence speed and greatly enhance the stability of the positioning results. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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23 pages, 5902 KiB  
Article
Assessment of Integrated Water Vapor Estimates from the iGMAS and the Brazilian Network GNSS Ground-Based Receivers in Rio de Janeiro
by Galdino V. Mota, Shuli Song and Katarzyna Stępniak
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(22), 2652; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11222652 - 13 Nov 2019
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 2911
Abstract
There is pressing demand for knowledge improvement of the integrated water vapor (IWV) distribution in regions affected by heat islands that are associated with extreme rainfall events such as in the metropolitan area of Rio de Janeiro (MARJ). This work assessed the suitability [...] Read more.
There is pressing demand for knowledge improvement of the integrated water vapor (IWV) distribution in regions affected by heat islands that are associated with extreme rainfall events such as in the metropolitan area of Rio de Janeiro (MARJ). This work assessed the suitability and evaluation of the spatiotemporal distribution of Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) IWV from the cooperation of the International GNSS Monitoring and Assessment System (iGMAS) and the National Observatory (Observatório Nacional, ON) of Brazil, from the Brazilian Network for Continuous Monitoring (RBMC), and IWV products from Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) and radiosonde, jointly with surface meteorological data, in two sectors of the state of Rio de Janeiro from February 2015–August 2018. High variability of the near surface air temperature (T) and relative humidity (RH) were observed among eight meteorological sites. The mean T differences between sites, up to 4.4 °C, led to mean differences as high as 3.1 K for weighted mean temperature (Tm) and hence 0.83 mm for IWV differences. Local grid points of MODIS IWV estimates had relatively good agreement with the GNSS-derived IWV, with mean differences from –2.4–1.1 mm for the daytime passages of the satellites TERRA and AQUA and underestimation from –9 mm to –3 mm during nighttime overpasses. A contrasting behavior was found in the radiosonde IWV estimates compared with the estimates from GNSS. There were dry biases of 1.4 mm (3.7% lower than expected) by radiosonde IWV during the daytime, considering that all other estimates were unbiased and the differences between IWVGNSS and IWVRADS were consistent. Based on the IWV comparisons between radiosonde and GNSS at nighttime, the atmosphere over the radiosonde site is about 1.2 mm and 2.3 mm wetter than that over the RBMC RIOD and iGMAS RDJN stations, respectively. The atmosphere over the site RIOD was 1.2 mm wetter than over that of RDJN for all three-hour means. These results showed that there were important variabilities in the meteorological conditions and in the distribution of water vapor in the MERJ. The data from the iGMAS RDJN station were feasible, together with those from the RBMC, MODIS, and radiosonde data, to investigate IWV in the region with occurrence of heat islands and peculiar physiographic and meteorological characteristics. This work recommends the magnification of the GNSS network in the state of Rio de Janeiro with the use of data from complete meteorological station collocated near every GNSS receiver, aiming to improve local IWV estimates and serving as additional support for operational numerical assimilation, weather forecast, and nowcast of extreme rainfall and flooding events. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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20 pages, 5295 KiB  
Article
A Decentralized Processing Schema for Efficient and Robust Real-time Multi-GNSS Satellite Clock Estimation
by Xinyuan Jiang, Shengfeng Gu, Pan Li, Maorong Ge and Harald Schuh
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(21), 2595; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11212595 - 05 Nov 2019
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 2830
Abstract
Real-time multi-GNSS precise point positioning (PPP) requires the support of high-rate satellite clock corrections. Due to the large number of ambiguity parameters, it is difficult to update clocks at high frequency in real-time for a large reference network. With the increasing number of [...] Read more.
Real-time multi-GNSS precise point positioning (PPP) requires the support of high-rate satellite clock corrections. Due to the large number of ambiguity parameters, it is difficult to update clocks at high frequency in real-time for a large reference network. With the increasing number of satellites of multi-GNSS constellations and the number of stations, real-time high-rate clock estimation becomes a big challenge. In this contribution, we propose a decentralized clock estimation (DECE) strategy, in which both undifferenced (UD) and epoch-differenced (ED) mode are implemented but run separately in different computers, and their output clocks are combined in another process to generate a unique product. While redundant UD and/or ED processing lines can be run in offsite computers to improve the robustness, processing lines for different networks can also be included to improve the clock quality. The new strategy is realized based on the Position and Navigation Data Analyst (PANDA) software package and is experimentally validated with about 110 real-time stations for clock estimation by comparison of the estimated clocks and the PPP performance applying estimated clocks. The results of the real-time PPP experiment using 12 global stations show that with the greatly improved computational efficiency, 3.14 cm in horizontal and 5.51 cm in vertical can be achieved using the estimated DECE clock. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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20 pages, 6509 KiB  
Article
Precise Orbit Determination for BeiDou GEO/IGSO Satellites during Orbit Maneuvering with Pseudo-Stochastic Pulses
by Zhiwei Qin, Guanwen Huang, Qin Zhang, Le Wang, Xingyuan Yan, Shichao Xie, Yu Cao and Xiaolei Wang
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(21), 2587; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11212587 - 04 Nov 2019
Cited by 7 | Viewed by 3452
Abstract
In order to provide better service for the Asia-Pacific region, the BeiDou navigation satellite system (BDS) is designed as a constellation containing medium earth orbit (MEO), geostationary earth orbit (GEO), and inclined geosynchronous orbit (IGSO). However, the multi-orbit configuration brings great challenges for [...] Read more.
In order to provide better service for the Asia-Pacific region, the BeiDou navigation satellite system (BDS) is designed as a constellation containing medium earth orbit (MEO), geostationary earth orbit (GEO), and inclined geosynchronous orbit (IGSO). However, the multi-orbit configuration brings great challenges for orbit determination. When orbit maneuvering, the orbital elements of the maneuvered satellites from broadcast ephemeris are unusable for several hours, which makes it difficult to estimate the initial orbit in the process of precise orbit determination. In addition, the maneuvered force information is unknown, which brings systematic orbit integral errors. In order to avoid these errors, observation data are removed from the iterative adjustment. For the above reasons, the precise orbit products of maneuvered satellites are missing from IGS (international GNSS (Global Navigation Satellite System) service) and iGMAS (international GNSS monitoring and assessment system). This study proposes a method to determine the precise orbits of maneuvered satellites for BeiDou GEO and IGSO. The initial orbits of maneuvered satellites could be backward forecasted according to the precise orbit products. The systematic errors caused by unmodeled maneuvered force are absorbed by estimated pseudo-stochastic pulses. The proposed method for determining the precise orbits of maneuvered satellites is validated by analyzing data of stations from the Multi-GNSS Experiment (MGEX). The results show that the precise orbits of maneuvered satellites can be estimated correctly when orbit maneuvering, which could supplement the precise products from the analysis centers of IGS and iGMAS. It can significantly improve the integrality and continuity of the precise products and subsequently provide better precise products for users. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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20 pages, 6947 KiB  
Article
A Strategy to Mitigate the Ionospheric Scintillation Effects on BDS Precise Point Positioning: Cycle-Slip Threshold Model
by Xiaomin Luo, Yidong Lou, Shengfeng Gu and Weiwei Song
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(21), 2551; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11212551 - 30 Oct 2019
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 2912
Abstract
Because of the special design of BeiDou navigation satellite system (BDS) constellation, the effects of ionospheric scintillation on operational BDS generally are more serious than on the global positioning system (GPS). As BDS is currently providing global services, it is increasingly important to [...] Read more.
Because of the special design of BeiDou navigation satellite system (BDS) constellation, the effects of ionospheric scintillation on operational BDS generally are more serious than on the global positioning system (GPS). As BDS is currently providing global services, it is increasingly important to seek strategies to mitigate the scintillation effects on BDS navigation and positioning services. In this study, an improved cycle-slip threshold model is proposed to decrease the high false-alarm rate of cycle-slips under scintillation conditions, thus avoiding the frequent unnecessary ambiguity resets in BDS precise point positioning (PPP) solution. We use one-year (from 23 March 2015 to 23 March 2016) BDS dataset from Hong Kong Sha Tin (HKST) station (22.4°N, 114.2°E; geomagnetic latitude: 15.4°N) to model the cycle-slip threshold and try to make it suitable for three types of BDS satellites and multiple scintillation levels. The availability of our mitigation strategy is validated by using three months (from 1 September 2015 to 30 November 2015) BDS dataset collected at 10 global navigation satellite system (GNSS) stations in Hong Kong. Positioning results demonstrate that our mitigated BDS PPP can prevent the sudden fluctuations of positioning errors induced by the ionospheric scintillation. Statistical results of BDS PPP experiments show that the mitigated solution can maintain an accuracy of about 0.08 m and 0.10 m in the horizontal and vertical components, respectively. Compared with standard BDS PPP, the accuracy of mitigated PPP can be improved by approximately 24.1%, 38.2%, and 47.9% in the east, north, and up directions, respectively. Our study demonstrates that considering different scintillation levels to establish appropriate cycle-slip threshold model in PPP processing can efficiently mitigate the ionospheric scintillation effects on BDS PPP. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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17 pages, 1499 KiB  
Article
Increasing the Number of Sea Surface Reflected Signals Received by GNSS-Reflectometry Altimetry Satellite Using the Nadir Antenna Observation Capability Optimization Method
by Zongqiang Liu, Wei Zheng, Fan Wu, Guohua Kang, Zhaowei Li, Qingqing Wang and Zhen Cui
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(21), 2473; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11212473 - 23 Oct 2019
Cited by 8 | Viewed by 3448
Abstract
High spatial resolution Global Navigation Satellite System-Reflectometry (GNSS-R) sea surface altimetry is of great significance for extracting precise information from sea surface topography. The nadir antenna is one of the key payloads for the GNSS-R altimetry satellite to capture and track the sea [...] Read more.
High spatial resolution Global Navigation Satellite System-Reflectometry (GNSS-R) sea surface altimetry is of great significance for extracting precise information from sea surface topography. The nadir antenna is one of the key payloads for the GNSS-R altimetry satellite to capture and track the sea surface GNSS reflected signal. The observation capability of the nadir antenna directly determines the number of received reflected signals, which, in turn, affects the spatial resolution of the GNSS-R altimetry. The parameters affecting the ability of the nadir antenna to receive the reflected signal mainly include antenna gain, half-power beam width (HPBW), and pointing angle. Thus far, there are rarely studies on the observation capability of GNSS-R satellite nadir antenna. The design of operational satellite antenna does not fully combine the above three parameters to optimize the design of GNSS-R nadir antenna. Therefore, it is necessary to establish a GNSS-R spaceborne nadir antenna observation capability optimization method. This is the key to improving the number of sea surface reflected signals received by the GNSS-R altimeter satellites, thereby increasing the spatial resolution of the altimetry. This paper has carried out the following research on this. Firstly, based on the GNSS-R geometric relationship and signal processing theory, the nadir antenna signal-to-noise ratio model (NASNRM) with the gain and the elevation angle at the specular point (SP) as the main parameters is established. The accuracy of the model was verified using TechDemoSat-1 (TDS-1) observations. Secondly, based on the theory of electromagnetic scattering, considering the influence of HPBW and pointing angle on the antenna footprint size, a specular point filtering algorithm (SPFA) is proposed. Combined with the results obtained by NASNRM, the number of available specular points (SPs) is counted. The results show that as the antenna gain and the nadir-pointing angle increase, the number of SPs can reach a peak and then gradually decrease. Thirdly, combined with NASNRM and SPSA, a nadir antenna observation capability optimization method (NAOCOM) is proposed. The nadir antenna observation capability is characterized through the reflected signal utilization, and the results obtained by the method are used to optimize the combination of nadir antenna parameters. The research shows that when the orbital height of the GNSS-R satellite is 635 km, the optimal combination of nadir antenna parameters is 20.94 dBi for the gain and 32.82 degrees for the nadir-pointing angle, which can increase the observation capability of the TDS-1 satellite nadir antenna by up to 5.38 times. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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15 pages, 3209 KiB  
Article
Precise Orbit Determination for GNSS Maneuvering Satellite with the Constraint of a Predicted Clock
by Xiaolei Dai, Yidong Lou, Zhiqiang Dai, Caibo Hu, Yaquan Peng, Jing Qiao and Chuang Shi
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(16), 1949; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11161949 - 20 Aug 2019
Cited by 11 | Viewed by 3218
Abstract
Precise orbit products are essential and a prerequisite for global navigation satellite system (GNSS) applications, which, however, are unavailable or unusable when satellites are undertaking maneuvers. We propose a clock-constrained reverse precise point positioning (RPPP) method to generate the rather precise orbits for [...] Read more.
Precise orbit products are essential and a prerequisite for global navigation satellite system (GNSS) applications, which, however, are unavailable or unusable when satellites are undertaking maneuvers. We propose a clock-constrained reverse precise point positioning (RPPP) method to generate the rather precise orbits for GNSS maneuvering satellites. In this method, the precise clock estimates generated by the dynamic precise orbit determination (POD) processing before maneuvering are modeled and predicted to the maneuvering periods and they constrain the RPPP POD during maneuvering. The prediction model is developed according to different clock types, of which the 2-h prediction error is 0.31 ns and 1.07 ns for global positioning system (GPS) Rubidium (Rb) and Cesium (Cs) clocks, and 0.45 ns and 0.60 ns for the Beidou navigation satellite system (BDS) geostationary orbit (GEO) and inclined geosynchronous orbit (IGSO)/Median Earth orbit (MEO) satellite clocks, respectively. The performance of this proposed method is first evaluated using the normal observations without maneuvers. Experiment results show that, without clock-constraint, the average root mean square (RMS) of RPPP orbit solutions in the radial, cross-track and along-track directions is 69.3 cm, 5.4 cm and 5.7 cm for GPS satellites and 153.9 cm, 12.8 cm and 10.0 cm for BDS satellites. When the constraint of predicted satellite clocks is introduced, the average RMS is dramatically reduced in the radial direction by a factor of 7–11, with the value of 9.7 cm and 13.4 cm for GPS and BDS satellites. At last, the proposed method is further tested on the actual GPS and BDS maneuver events. The clock-constrained RPPP POD solution is compared to the forward and backward integration orbits of the dynamic POD solution. The resulting orbit differences are less than 20 cm in all three directions for GPS satellite, and less than 30 cm in the radial and cross-track directions and up to 100 cm in the along-track direction for BDS satellites. From the orbit differences, the maneuver start and end time is detected, which reveals that the maneuver duration of GPS satellites is less than 2 min, and the maneuver events last from 22.5 min to 107 min for different BDS satellites. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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21 pages, 5714 KiB  
Article
Intelligent GPS L1 LOS/Multipath/NLOS Classifiers Based on Correlator-, RINEX- and NMEA-Level Measurements
by Bing Xu, Qiongqiong Jia, Yiran Luo and Li-Ta Hsu
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(16), 1851; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11161851 - 08 Aug 2019
Cited by 44 | Viewed by 5350
Abstract
This paper proposes to use a correlator-level global positioning system (GPS) line-of-sight/multipath/non-line-of-sight (LOS/MP/NLOS) signal reception classifier to improve positioning performance in an urban environment. Conventional LOS/MP/NLOS classifiers, referred to as national marine electronics association (NMEA)-level and receiver independent exchange format (RINEX)-level classifiers, are [...] Read more.
This paper proposes to use a correlator-level global positioning system (GPS) line-of-sight/multipath/non-line-of-sight (LOS/MP/NLOS) signal reception classifier to improve positioning performance in an urban environment. Conventional LOS/MP/NLOS classifiers, referred to as national marine electronics association (NMEA)-level and receiver independent exchange format (RINEX)-level classifiers, are usually performed using attributes extracted from basic observables or measurements such as received signal strength, satellite elevation angle, code pseudorange, etc. The NMEA/RINEX-level classification rate is limited because the complex signal propagation in urban environment is not fully manifested in these end attributes. In this paper, LOS/MP/NLOS features were extracted at the baseband signal processing stage. Multicorrelator is implemented in a GPS software-defined receiver (SDR) and exploited to generate features from the autocorrelation function (ACF). A robust LOS/MP/NLOS classifier using a supervised machine learning algorithm, support vector machine (SVM), is then trained. It is also proposed that the Skymask and code pseudorange double difference observable are used to label the real signal type. Raw GPS intermediate frequency data were collected in urban areas in Hong Kong and were postprocessed using a self-developed SDR, which can easily output correlator-level LOS/MP/NLOS features. The SDR measurements were saved in the file with the format of NMEA and RINEX. A fair comparison among NMEA-, RINEX-, and correlator-level classifiers was then carried out on a common ground. Results show that the correlator-level classifier improves the metric of F1 score by about 25% over the conventional NMEA- and RINEX-level classifiers for testing data collected at different places to that of training data. In addition to this finding, correlator-level classifier is found to be more feasible in practical applications due to its less dependency on surrounding scenarios compared with the NMEA/RINEX-level classifiers. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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29 pages, 12156 KiB  
Article
BDS-3 Time Group Delay and Its Effect on Standard Point Positioning
by Peipei Dai, Yulong Ge, Weijin Qin and Xuhai Yang
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(15), 1819; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11151819 - 03 Aug 2019
Cited by 17 | Viewed by 3072
Abstract
The development of the BeiDou navigation system (BDS) is divided into three phases: The demonstration system (BDS-1), the regional system (BDS-2) and the global BeiDou navigation system (BDS-3). At present, the construction of the global BeiDou navigation system (BDS-3) constellation network is progressing [...] Read more.
The development of the BeiDou navigation system (BDS) is divided into three phases: The demonstration system (BDS-1), the regional system (BDS-2) and the global BeiDou navigation system (BDS-3). At present, the construction of the global BeiDou navigation system (BDS-3) constellation network is progressing very smoothly. The signal design and functionality of BDS-3 are different from those of BDS-1 and BDS-2. The BDS-3 satellite not only broadcasts B1I (1561.098 MHz) and B3I (1268.52 MHz) signals but also broadcasts new signals B1C (1575.42 MHz) and B2a (1176.45 MHz). In this work, six tracking stations of the international GNSS monitoring and assessment system (iGMAS) were selected, and 41 consecutive days of observation data, were collected. To fully exploit the code observations of BDS-2 and BDS-3, the time group delay (TGD) correction model of BDS-2 and BDS-3 are described in detail. To further verify the efficacy of the broadcast TGD parameters in the broadcast ephemeris, the standard point positioning (SPP) of all the signals from BDS-2 and BDS-3 with and without TGD correction was studied. The experiments showed that the B1I SPP accuracy of BDS-2 was increased by approximately 50% in both the horizontal and vertical components, and B1I/B3I were improved by approximately 70% in the horizontal component and 47.4% in the vertical component with TGD correction. The root mean square (RMS) value of B1I and B1C from BDS-3 with TGD correction was enhanced by approximately 60%–70% in the horizontal component and by approximately 50% in the vertical component. The B2a-based SPP was increased by 60.2% and 64.4% in the east and north components, respectively, and the up component was increased by approximately 19.8%. For the B1I/B3I and B1C/B2a dual-frequency positioning accuracy with TGD correction, the improvement in the horizontal component ranges from 62.1% to 75.0%, and the vertical component was improved by approximately 45%. Furthermore, the positioning accuracy of the BDS-2 + BDS-3 combination constellation was obviously higher than that of BDS-2 or BDS-3. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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20 pages, 8634 KiB  
Article
An Improved Hatch Filter Algorithm towards Sub-Meter Positioning Using only Android Raw GNSS Measurements without External Augmentation Corrections
by Jianghui Geng, Enming Jiang, Guangcai Li, Shaoming Xin and Na Wei
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(14), 1679; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11141679 - 15 Jul 2019
Cited by 53 | Viewed by 4960
Abstract
In May 2016, the availability of GNSS raw measurements on smart devices was announced by Google with the release of Android 7. It means that developers can access carrier-phase and pseudorange measurements and decode navigation messages for the first time from mass-market Android-devices. [...] Read more.
In May 2016, the availability of GNSS raw measurements on smart devices was announced by Google with the release of Android 7. It means that developers can access carrier-phase and pseudorange measurements and decode navigation messages for the first time from mass-market Android-devices. In this paper, an improved Hatch filter algorithm, i.e., Three-Thresholds and Single-Difference Hatch filter (TT-SD Hatch filter), is proposed for sub-meter single point positioning with raw GNSS measurements on Android devices without any augmentation correction input, where the carrier-phase smoothed pseudorange window width adaptively varies according to the three-threshold detection for ionospheric cumulative errors, cycle slips and outliers. In the mean time, it can also eliminate the inconsistency of receiver clock bias between pseudorange and carrier-phase by inter-satellite difference. To eliminate the effects of frequent smoothing window resets, we combine TT-SD Hatch filter and Kalman filter for both time update and measurement update. The feasibility of the improved TT-SD Hatch filter method is then verified using static and kinematic experiments with a Nexus 9 Android tablet. The result of the static experiment demonstrates that the position RMS of TT-SD Hatch filter is about 0.6 and 0.8 m in the horizontal and vertical components, respectively. It is about 2 and 1.6 m less than the GNSS chipset solutions, and about 10 and 10 m less than the classical Hatch filter solution, respectively. Moreover, the TT-SD Hatch filter can accurately detect the cycle slips and outliers, and reset the smoothed window in time. It thus avoids the smoothing failure of Hatch filter when a large cycle-slip or an outlier occurs in the observations. Meanwhile, with the aid of the Kalman filter, TT-SD Hatch filter can keep continuously positioning at the sub-meter level. The result of the kinematic experiment demonstrates that the TT-SD Hatch filter solution can converge after a few minutes, and the 2D error is about 0.9 m, which is about 64%, 89%, and 92% smaller than that of the chipset solution, the traditional Hatch filter solution and standard single point solution, respectively. Finally, the TT-SD Hatch filter solution can recover a continuous driving track in this kinematic test. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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15 pages, 3310 KiB  
Article
Improving the Positioning Accuracy of Satellite-Borne GNSS-R Specular Reflection Point on Sea Surface Based on the Ocean Tidal Correction Positioning Method
by Fan Wu, Wei Zheng, Zhaowei Li and Zongqiang Liu
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(13), 1626; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11131626 - 09 Jul 2019
Cited by 8 | Viewed by 3678
Abstract
The positioning error of the specular reflection point is the main error source of Global Navigation Satellite System Reflectometry (GNSS-R) satellite sea surface altimetry. The existing specular reflection point geometric positioning methods do not consider the static-state elevation difference of tens of meters [...] Read more.
The positioning error of the specular reflection point is the main error source of Global Navigation Satellite System Reflectometry (GNSS-R) satellite sea surface altimetry. The existing specular reflection point geometric positioning methods do not consider the static-state elevation difference of tens of meters and the decimeter-level time-varying elevation difference between the reflection reference surface and the instantaneous sea surface. The resulting positioning error restricts the GNSS-R satellite sea surface altimetry from reaching cm-level high accuracy on the reference datum. Under the premise of the basic static-state elevation positioning error correction, reducing the time-varying elevation positioning error is the key to improving positioning accuracy. In this study, based on the principle of elevation correction of GNSS-R reflection reference surface, the main parameter that determines the real-time variation of sea surface height, ocean tide, is used to correct the specular reflection point from geoid to ocean tidal surface. The positioning error caused by the time-varying elevation error of the reflection reference surface is reduced, the positioning accuracy is improved, and the improvement is quantified. According to the research results, the ocean tidal correction positioning (OTCP) method improves the positioning accuracy by 0.31 m. The positioning accuracy improvement has a good correlation with the corresponding tidal height modulo, and the improvement is 1.07 times of the tidal height modulo. In the offshore, the tidal height gradient modulo is greater than the deep sea, the gradient of the tidal positioning correction has a good response to the tidal height gradient modulo, while the sensitivity of this response decreases in the deep sea. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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16 pages, 8899 KiB  
Article
Validation of 7 Years in-Flight HY-2A Calibration Microwave Radiometer Products Using Numerical Weather Model and Radiosondes
by Zhilu Wu, Jungang Wang, Yanxiong Liu, Xiufeng He, Yang Liu and Wenxue Xu
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(13), 1616; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11131616 - 08 Jul 2019
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 4699
Abstract
Haiyang-2A (HY-2A) has been working in-flight for over seven years, and the accuracy of HY-2A calibration microwave radiometer (CMR) data is extremely important for the wet troposphere delay correction (WTC) in sea surface height (SSH) determination. We present a comprehensive evaluation of the [...] Read more.
Haiyang-2A (HY-2A) has been working in-flight for over seven years, and the accuracy of HY-2A calibration microwave radiometer (CMR) data is extremely important for the wet troposphere delay correction (WTC) in sea surface height (SSH) determination. We present a comprehensive evaluation of the HY-2A CMR observation using the numerical weather model (NWM) for all the data available period from October 2011 to February 2018, including the WTC and the precipitable water vapor (PWV). The ERA(ECMWF Re-Analysis)-Interim products from European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) are used for the validation of HY-2A WTC and PWV products. In general, a global agreement of root-mean-square (RMS) of 2.3 cm in WTC and 3.6 mm in PWV are demonstrated between HY-2A observation and ERA-Interim products. Systematic biases are revealed where before 2014 there was a positive WTC/PWV bias and after that, a negative one. Spatially, HY-2A CMR products show a larger bias in polar regions compared with mid-latitude regions and tropical regions and agree better in the Antarctic than in the Arctic with NWM. Moreover, HY-2A CMR products have larger biases in the coastal area, which are all caused by the brightness temperature (TB) contamination from land or sea ice. Temporally, the WTC/PWV biases increase from October 2011 to March 2014 with a systematic bias over 1 cm in WTC and 2 mm in PWV, and the maximum RMS values of 4.62 cm in WTC and 7.61 mm in PWV occur in August 2013, which is because of the unsuitable retrieval coefficients and systematic TB measurements biases from 37 GHz band. After April 2014, the TB bias is corrected, HY-2A CMR products agree very well with NWM from April 2014 to May 2017 with the average RMS of 1.68 cm in WTC and 2.65 mm in PWV. However, since June 2017, TB measurements from the 18.7 GHz band become unstable, which led to the huge differences between HY-2A CMR products and the NWM with an average RMS of 2.62 cm in WTC and 4.33 mm in PWV. HY-2A CMR shows high accuracy when three bands work normally and further calibration for HY-2A CMR is in urgent need. Furtherly, 137 global coastal radiosonde stations were used to validate HY-2A CMR. The validation based on radiosonde data shows the same variation trend in time of HY-2A CMR compared to the results from ECMWF, which verifies the results from ECMWF. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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17 pages, 4157 KiB  
Article
A Priori Solar Radiation Pressure Model for BeiDou-3 MEO Satellites
by Xingyuan Yan, Chenchen Liu, Guanwen Huang, Qin Zhang, Le Wang, Zhiwei Qin and Shichao Xie
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(13), 1605; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11131605 - 05 Jul 2019
Cited by 25 | Viewed by 4038
Abstract
Due to the cuboid satellite body of BeiDou-3 satellites, the accuracy of their orbit showed a trend of systematic variation with the sun-satellite-earth angle (ε) using the Extend CODE Orbit Model (ECOM1). Therefore, an a priori cuboid box-wing model (named the cuboid model) [...] Read more.
Due to the cuboid satellite body of BeiDou-3 satellites, the accuracy of their orbit showed a trend of systematic variation with the sun-satellite-earth angle (ε) using the Extend CODE Orbit Model (ECOM1). Therefore, an a priori cuboid box-wing model (named the cuboid model) is necessary to compensate ECOM1. Considering that the body-dimensions and optical properties of the BeiDou-3 satellites used to construct the box-wing model have not yet been fully released, the adjustable box-wing model (ABW) was used for precise orbit determination (POD). The a priori cuboid box-wing model was directly estimated by the precision radiation accelerations, obtained from ABW POD. When using ECOM1 model, for 14 < β < 40°, a linear systematic variation of D0 related to the elevation of the sun above the orbital plane (β-angle) with a slope of 0.048 nm/s2/°, was found for C30. After adding the cuboid model to assist ECOM1 (named Cuboid + ECOM1), the slope was reduced to 0.005 nm/s2/°, and for C20 satellite, the standard deviation (STD) of D0 was improved, from 1.28 to 0.85 nm/s2 (34%). For satellite laser ranging (SLR) validation, when using the ECOM1 model, the systematic variation with the ε angle was about 14 cm for C20 and C30. After using the Cuboid + ECOM1 model, the variation was significantly reduced to about 5 cm. For C20 and C21, compared with the ECOM1 model, the root mean square (RMS) of the ECOM2 and Cuboid + ECOM1 model was improved by about 0.54 (10.3%) and 0.43 cm (8.7%). For C29 and C30, the RMS of ECOM2 and Cuboid + ECOM1 model was improved for about 0.7 (10.9%) and 1.6 cm (25.6%). Finally, the RMS of the SLR residuals of 4.37 to 4.88 cm was achieved for BeiDou-3 POD. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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16 pages, 2430 KiB  
Article
On the Study of Influences of Different Factors on the Rapid Tropospheric Tomography
by Wenxuan Liu, Yidong Lou, Weixing Zhang, Jinfang Huang, Yaozong Zhou and Haoshan Zhang
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(13), 1545; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11131545 - 28 Jun 2019
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 2473
Abstract
A rapid tropospheric tomography system was developed by using algebraic reconstruction technique. Influences of different factors on the tomographic results, including the ground meteorological data, the multi-Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) observations, the ground station distribution and the tomographic horizontal resolution, were systematically [...] Read more.
A rapid tropospheric tomography system was developed by using algebraic reconstruction technique. Influences of different factors on the tomographic results, including the ground meteorological data, the multi-Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) observations, the ground station distribution and the tomographic horizontal resolution, were systematically investigated. In order to exclude the impacts from discrepancies of water vapor information between input observations and references on the tomographic results, the latest reanalysis products, ERA5, which were taken as references for result evaluations, were used to simulate slant wet delay (SWD) observations at GNSS stations. Besides, the slant delays derived from GNSS processing were also used to evaluate the reliability of simulated observations. Tomography results show that the input both SWD and ground meteorological data could improve the tomographic results where SWD mainly improve the results at middle layers (500 to 5000 m, namely 2 to 16 layer) and ground meteorological data could improve the humidity fields at bottom layers further (0 to 500 m, namely 0 to 2 layer). Compared to the usage of Global Positioning System (GPS) only SWD, the inclusion of multi-GNSS SWD does not significantly improve the tomographic results at all layers due to the almost unchanged dispersion of puncture points of GNSS signals. However, increases in the ground GNSS stations can benefit the tomography, with improvements of more than 10% at bottom and middle layers. Higher tomographic horizontal resolution can further slightly improve the tomographic results (about 3-6% from 0.5 to 0.25 degrees), which, however, will also increase the computational burden at the same time. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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21 pages, 7573 KiB  
Article
GPS + BDS Network Real-Time Differential Positioning Using a Position Domain Estimation Method
by Jianhui Cui, Rui Yan, Chenlong Deng, Weiming Tang, Xuan Zou, Mingxing Shen, Qian Liu, Yawei Wang and Yangyang Li
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(12), 1480; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11121480 - 21 Jun 2019
Cited by 4 | Viewed by 5187
Abstract
The network real-time differential positioning technique is a good choice for meter and sub-meter level’s navigation. More attention has been paid to the Global Positioning System (GPS) and GPS + GLONASS (GLObal NAvigation Satellite System) network real-time differential positioning, but less on the [...] Read more.
The network real-time differential positioning technique is a good choice for meter and sub-meter level’s navigation. More attention has been paid to the Global Positioning System (GPS) and GPS + GLONASS (GLObal NAvigation Satellite System) network real-time differential positioning, but less on the GPS + BDS (BeiDou Navigation Satellite System) combination. This paper focuses on the GPS + BDS network real-time differential positioning. Since the noise of pseudorange observation is large, carrier-phase-smoothed pseudorange is usually used in the network real-time differential positioning to improve the positioning accuracy, while it will be interrupted once the satellite signal is lost or a cycle slip occurs. An improved algorithm in the position domain based on position variation information is proposed. The improved method is immune to the smoothing window and only depends on the number of available satellites. The performance of the network real-time differential positioning using the improved method is evaluated. The performance of GPS + BDS combination is compared with GPS-only solution as well. The results show that the positioning accuracy can be increased by around 10%–40% using the improved method compared with the traditional one. The improved method is less affected by the satellite constellation. The positioning accuracy of GPS + BDS solution is better than that of GPS-only solution, and can reach up to 0.217 m, 0.159 m and 0.330 m in the north, east and up components for the static user station, and 0.122 m, 0.133 m and 0.432 m for the dynamic user station. The positioning accuracy variation does not only depend on whether the user is inside or outside the network, but also on the position relation between the user and network. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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11 pages, 2628 KiB  
Article
Accuracy of Deformation Rates from Campaign GPS Surveys Considering Extended Observation Session and Antenna Set-Up Errors
by Yener Turen and D. Ugur Sanli
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(10), 1225; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11101225 - 23 May 2019
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 3283
Abstract
GPS campaign measurements are still in use in the monitoring of ground deformation. Campaign measurements are frequently referred to because installing permanent stations are costly, and they cannot be installed at the desired density. Using the data from the International Global Navigation Satellite [...] Read more.
GPS campaign measurements are still in use in the monitoring of ground deformation. Campaign measurements are frequently referred to because installing permanent stations are costly, and they cannot be installed at the desired density. Using the data from the International Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) Service (IGS) permanent GPS stations, the duration, sampling interval, etc. of the campaign measurements can be simulated. Thus, the contribution of the campaign data to the monitoring of the ground deformation can be evaluated. In this study, we carried out an experiment with the aim of determining the deformation of tectonic plates at the selected IGS stations more accurately considering by extending the observation duration to a full 24 h length. We also made an attempt to take into consideration the antenna set up errors developing a scenario referring to the information available in the literature. We have decimated the continuous data of 40 globally scattered IGS stations into monthly intervals between 2012 and 2016 and estimated the deformation rates at the IGS stations from a continuous time series of four years. The continuous time series solutions for those stations were produced by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), NASA. We compare velocities (i.e., the deformation rates) determined from GPS campaigns (in which the sampling was performed monthly and four-monthly) with those of the continuous data. The major conclusion of this study is that the vertical velocity estimation accuracy of the GPS campaign measurements had been improved by about 85% by extending the session duration to 24 h. The repetition interval of GPS campaign measurements as per one observation every four months produced only slightly coarser accuracy (i.e., on the average 8% poorer) than those of the measurements repeated once every month. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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15 pages, 4088 KiB  
Article
Improving the Performance of Multi-GNSS (Global Navigation Satellite System) Ambiguity Fixing for Airborne Kinematic Positioning over Antarctica
by Min Li, Tianhe Xu, Frank Flechtner, Christoph Förste, Biao Lu and Kaifei He
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(8), 992; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11080992 - 25 Apr 2019
Cited by 8 | Viewed by 4371
Abstract
Conventional relative kinematic positioning is difficult to be applied in the polar region of Earth since there is a very sparse distribution of reference stations, while precise point positioning (PPP), using data of a stand-alone receiver, is recognized as a promising tool for [...] Read more.
Conventional relative kinematic positioning is difficult to be applied in the polar region of Earth since there is a very sparse distribution of reference stations, while precise point positioning (PPP), using data of a stand-alone receiver, is recognized as a promising tool for obtaining reliable and accurate trajectories of moving platforms. However, PPP and its integer ambiguity fixing performance could be much degraded by satellite orbits and clocks of poor quality, such as those of the geostationary Earth orbit (GEO) satellites of the BeiDou navigation satellite system (BDS), because temporal variation of orbit errors cannot be fully absorbed by ambiguities. To overcome such problems, a network-based processing, referred to as precise orbit positioning (POP), in which the satellite clock offsets are estimated with fixed precise orbits, is implemented in this study. The POP approach is validated in comparison with PPP in terms of integer ambiguity fixing and trajectory accuracy. In a simulation test, multi-GNSS (global navigation satellite system) observations over 14 days from 136 globally distributed MGEX (the multi-GNSS Experiment) receivers are used and four of them on the coast of Antarctica are processed in kinematic mode as moving stations. The results show that POP can improve the ambiguity fixing of all system combinations and significant improvement is found in the solution with BDS, since its large orbit errors are reduced in an integrated adjustment with satellite clock offsets. The four-system GPS+GLONASS+Galileo+BDS (GREC) fixed solution enables the highest 3D position accuracy of about 3.0 cm compared to 4.3 cm of the GPS-only solution. Through a real flight experiment over Antarctica, it is also confirmed that POP ambiguity fixing performs better and thus can considerably speed up (re-)convergence and reduce most of the fluctuations in PPP solutions, since the continuous tracking time is short compared to that in other regions. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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21 pages, 4645 KiB  
Article
Assessment of Different Stochastic Models for Inter-System Bias between GPS and BDS
by Nan Jiang, Tianhe Xu, Yan Xu, Guochang Xu and Harald Schuh
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(8), 989; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11080989 - 25 Apr 2019
Cited by 17 | Viewed by 3212
Abstract
Inter-system bias (ISB) will affect accuracy and processing time in integrated precise point positioning (PPP), and ISB stochastic models will largely determine the quality of ISB estimation. Thus, the impacts of four different stochastic models of ISB processing will be assessed and studied [...] Read more.
Inter-system bias (ISB) will affect accuracy and processing time in integrated precise point positioning (PPP), and ISB stochastic models will largely determine the quality of ISB estimation. Thus, the impacts of four different stochastic models of ISB processing will be assessed and studied in detail to further reveal the influence of ISB in positioning. They are ISB-PW considering ISB as a piece-wise constant, ISB-RW considering ISB as random walk, ISB-AD considering ISB as an arc-dependent constant, and ISB-WN considering ISB as white noise. Together with the model without introducing ISB called ISB-OFF, i.e., five different schemes, ISB-OFF, ISB-PW, ISB-RW, ISB-AD, and ISB-WN, will be designed and tested in this study. From the results of pseudorange residuals, it can be noticed that when considering ISB, the Root-Mean-Square (RMS) of ionosphere-free combined pseudorange residuals are much smaller than without ISB (ISB-OFF). The results of convergence time and positioning accuracy analysis show that PPP performance with ISB-AD is even worse than ISB-OFF, when using the precise products from the German Research Centre for Geosciences (GFZ) named as GBM products here; while the strategies of ISB-RW, and ISB-WN achieve the best results. For the products from Wuhan University called WUM products, a completely different result is achieved. PPP with the stochastic models of ISB-PW and ISB-AD perform best. The most likely reason is the ISB stochastic models applied by the analysis centers are consistent with those used in the PPP on the user side. So, ISB-RW, or ISB-WN is recommended when GBM products are used, and for the WUM products, ISB-PW, or ISB-AD is chosen. From the statistics of PPP precision during the convergence period, it can be concluded that considering ISB also has a great improvement on combined PPP accuracy during the initialization phase. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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16 pages, 6819 KiB  
Letter
Soil Moisture Estimation by GNSS Multipath Signal
by Xin Chang, Taoyong Jin, Kegen Yu, Yunwei Li, Jiancheng Li and Qiang Zhang
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(21), 2559; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11212559 - 31 Oct 2019
Cited by 17 | Viewed by 3994
Abstract
Global navigation satellite system (GNSS) multipath signals received by a geodetic-quality GNSS receiver can be used to estimate the water content of soil around the antenna. The direct signals from satellite to GNSS antenna are the most valuable signals in geodetic measurement, such [...] Read more.
Global navigation satellite system (GNSS) multipath signals received by a geodetic-quality GNSS receiver can be used to estimate the water content of soil around the antenna. The direct signals from satellite to GNSS antenna are the most valuable signals in geodetic measurement, such as positioning, navigation, GNSS control network, deformation monitoring, and so on. However, the GNSS antenna also captures the reflected signals from the ground, which contain information of surrounding environment, so that useful information about the reflection surface can be inferred by analyzing the reflected signal. This technique is termed as GNSS-interferometric reflectometry. The signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) data recorded by a receiver contains SNR component of reflected signals, which is related to the soil moisture of the ground. The changes of soil moisture content will cause the change of soil permittivity and reflectivity which are the key factors that make further change of the SNR of reflected signals. We used the measured data to evaluate the correlation between amplitude of multipath induced SNR time series and real soil moisture. An improved soil moisture estimation algorithm based on multipath induced SNR amplitude data is proposed in this paper. The performance of the proposed soil moisture estimation method is evaluated using the 15-month data recorded by PBO H2O GNSS station and a 14-day experiment in Wuhan, China. The experimental results show that the estimated soil moisture has a strong correlation with the real soil moisture and the estimation accuracy in terms of root-mean-square error (RMSE) is 0.0345 cm3cm−3 and 0.0339 cm3cm−3, respectively. Meanwhile, the application scope of the method is given. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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12 pages, 2407 KiB  
Technical Note
Adjustment of Transceiver Lever Arm Offset and Sound Speed Bias for GNSS-Acoustic Positioning
by Guanxu Chen, Yang Liu, Yanxiong Liu, Ziwen Tian and Menghao Li
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(13), 1606; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11131606 - 05 Jul 2019
Cited by 26 | Viewed by 5828
Abstract
Global Navigation Satellite System—Acoustic (GNSS-A) positioning is the main technique for seafloor geodetic positioning. A transceiver lever arm offset and sound velocity bias in seawater are the main systematic errors of the GNSS-A positioning technique. Based on data from a sea trial in [...] Read more.
Global Navigation Satellite System—Acoustic (GNSS-A) positioning is the main technique for seafloor geodetic positioning. A transceiver lever arm offset and sound velocity bias in seawater are the main systematic errors of the GNSS-A positioning technique. Based on data from a sea trial in shallow water, this paper studies the functional model of GNSS-A positioning. The impact of the two systematic errors on seafloor positioning is analysed and corresponding processing methods are proposed. The results show that the offset in the lever arm measurement should be parameterised in the observation equation. Given the high correlation between the vertical lever arm offset and the vertical coordinate of the seafloor station, a sample search method was introduced to fix the vertical offset correction. If the calibration of the sound velocity profiler cannot be ensured, the correction parameter of the sound velocity bias should be solved. According to the refined functional model and corrections, the position of a seafloor station in shallow water can be determined with a precision of better than 1 cm. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Global Navigation Satellite Systems for Earth Observing System)
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