The Low-Earth-Orbiting (LEO) satellite has a fast motion and thus contributes to rapid changes in satellite geometric distribution, which can effectively mitigate multipath effects and offer more available observations. Recently, some studies have investigated LEO-augmented Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) positioning and navigation. However, the study of LEO-augmented global ionospheric modeling was not yet available. In this paper, we present the performance and accuracy of global ionospheric model augmented by LEO constellation for the first time. Based on the three kinds of designed LEO constellations with 60, 96, and 192 satellite simulation data, the results show that LEO observations can expand the coverage and increase the density of ionospheric pierce points (IPPs). Meanwhile, the density of IPPs becomes higher with an increasing number of LEO satellites. When the cutoff elevation is set to 40°, the IPP distribution of GNSS+LEO is still better than that of GNSS-only at 10°. This way the cutoff elevation angle of the GNSS measurements can be increased, since the mapping function error and the multipath effects are reduced. Furthermore, the performances of global ionosphere maps based on the observations of GNSS-only and GNSS+LEO scenarios are evaluated. Compared with GNSS-only, the minimum and maximum bias can be reduced from −18.1 to −7.0 total electron content unit and from 12.6 to 6.4 total electron content unit, respectively, and the root-mean-square values with LEO constellations of 60, 96, and 192 satellites improve by 35.9%, 46.5%, and 50%, respectively.
Key Points:• LEO satellite was utilized for global ionosphere modeling • LEO satellite observations can fill the gap of missing spatial and temporal values in existing GNSS-based ionospheric modeling • By combining LEO constellation and Multi-GNSS simulated datasets, higher accuracy and higher spatial model can be achieved