Gain Pattern Reconstruction of GPS Satellite Antennas Using a Global Receiver Network

Abstract

The increasing number of GNSS applications with reliability and integrity calls for the implementation and integration of monitoring systems that can be used to improve employed error and threat models (Thombre et al., 2018;Wang & Shen, 2020). For safety-critical applications, integrity protection levels are computed based on the expected characteristics of the error sources in the GNSS positioning system (Walter 2017). Aside from those related to signal propagation, the receiver, and its location, errors for system-based parameters are also included in the positioning error budget. Fundamentally, such parameters include satellite ephemeris, satellite clock errors, and signal biases.On a routine basis, most of these parameters are estimated by the service provider and delivered to the user via the broadcast navigation message (Langley et al., 2017). However, system-based irregularities in the transmitted signal characteristics that lead to errors in the positioning solution may be more difficult to observe Deutsches Zentrum für Luft-und Raumfahrt (DLR),