Estimation of SLR station coordinates by means of SLR measurements to kinematic orbit of LEO satellites

Jinyun Guo,Yi Shen,Xin Liu,Qiaoli Kong,Youcun Wang,Yu Sun

doi:10.1186/s40623-018-0973-7

Abstract

Generally, the dynamical model is used to estimate coordinates of satellite laser ranging (SLR) stations. In this paper, we put forward a kinematic method to estimate the coordinates of SLR stations by using global navigation satellite system (GNSS) technique onboard a low Earth orbiting (LEO) satellite. We applied it to the processing of SLR and GNSS observations of the GRACE-A satellite from January to December 2012. We found that the LEO satellite as a space-based connection between SLR and GNSS techniques allowed the precise estimation of SLR site positions with the agreement level of 2–3 cm with respective to SLRF2014. The SLR network can be attached to the IGS network at the centimeter level. The results show that the proposed method is feasible for determining the coordinates of SLR stations as an idea for the satellite-based integration of different space geodetic techniques.

Highlights

The building and maintenance of International Terrestrial Reference Frame (ITRF), as the realization of the International Terrestrial Reference System (ITRS), is completed by the International Earth Rotation and Reference Systems Service (IERS)
The adopted techniques for the ITRF, namely Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS), satellite laser ranging (SLR), very long baseline interferometry (VLBI) and Doppler orbitography radiopositioning integrated by Satellite (DORIS), have developed their independent scientific services in the International Association of Geodesy (IAG)
GRACE‐A kinematic precise orbit determination (POD) We investigated the performance of the method for the estimation of SLR station coordinates by applying it to process GRACE-A data in January–December, 2012

Summary

Introduction

The building and maintenance of International Terrestrial Reference Frame (ITRF), as the realization of the International Terrestrial Reference System (ITRS), is completed by the International Earth Rotation and Reference Systems Service (IERS). The International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics (IUGG) has formally recommended and adopted the ITRF as the basis of the Earth science applications (Altamimi et al 2011). The adopted techniques for the ITRF, namely Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS), satellite laser ranging (SLR), very long baseline interferometry (VLBI) and Doppler orbitography radiopositioning integrated by Satellite (DORIS), have developed their independent scientific services in the International Association of Geodesy (IAG). The actual computation results of geodynamic satellites are main contribution to the ITRF for SLR technique (Altamimi et al 2011; Shen et al 2015; Otsubo et al 2016).

Methods

Results

Conclusion