Indoor receiving signal strength based visible light positioning enabled with equivalent virtual lamps.

Abstract

Visible light positioning (VLP) has become one of the most potent alternative methods in indoor positioning scenarios. However, the system performance of VLP is largely related to the characteristics of the wireless optical channel. Limited access resulting from shadowing, obstacles, and multipath propagation between transmitters and photodetectors might lead to positioning failure. In this paper, we propose a mirror-assisted VLP method based on the received signal strength algorithm. By introducing specular reflection into the system model, multipath propagation can be effectively alleviated, making it possible to implement VLP with limited accessibility of LEDs. Simulation results show that the proposed approach, based on the assumption of equivalent virtual lamps, can mitigate the non-line-of-sight interference in a classical four-lamp room. Average positioning performance improves by 25% with the assistance of a mirror. In addition, trilateration positioning can be realized when only two light-emitting diodes are available in the target room. The positioning accuracy of the two-LED VLP can reach ∼30c m under scenarios considering non-line-of-sight reflections.