A Fusion Framework Based on Sparse Gaussian–Wigner Prediction for Vehicle Localization Using GDOP of GPS Satellites

Abstract

In order to provide a robust estimate of vehicle position in all environments, especially, in challenging urban areas where GPS signals are blocked, a fusion framework based on sparse Gaussian-Wigner prediction (SG-WP) is proposed. This new approach combines the advantages of both the random matrix theory and the sparse property to provide enhanced vehicle localization capabilities. In this method, measurement noises are assumed to be non-Gaussian distributed, and a generalized error distribution is adopted as an approximation to non-Gaussian densities. To ensure the robustness and the stability of the proposed approach, road-test experiments in various scenarios, including free, partial, and complete GPS outages, were performed based on the geometric dilution of precision metric. During complete outages, the SG-WP fuses all available INS measurements to improve the vehicle position prediction, whereas in free outages, only GPS information is processed. Besides, information from both GPS and INS are taken as inputs during partial outages, and the slide window is then introduced to regulate the flow data. The experimental comparison with the existing prediction methods reveals that the proposed method can achieve accurate and reliable positioning for land vehicles in all considered environments when the measurement noises are Gaussian or non-Gaussian distributed.