Multiple Ambiguity Datum Precise Point Positioning Technique Using Multi-Constellation GNSS: GPS, GLONASS, Galileo and BeiDou

Abstract

Precise Point Positioning (PPP) is traditionally based on dual-frequency observations of GPS or GPS/GLONASS satellite navigation systems. Recently, new GNSS constellations, such as the European Galileo and the Chinese BeiDou are developing rapidly. With the new IGS project known as IGS MGEX which produces highly accurate GNSS orbital and clock products, multi-constellations PPP becomes feasible. On the other hand, the un-differenced ionosphere-free is commonly used as standard precise point positioning technique. However, the existence of receiver and satellite biases, which are absorbed by the ambiguities, significantly affected the convergence time. Between-satellite-single-difference (BSSD) ionosphere free PPP technique is traditionally used to cancel out the receiver related biases from both code and phase measurements. This paper introduces multiple ambiguity datum (MAD) PPP technique which can be applied to separate the code and phase measurements removing the receiver and satellite code biases affecting the GNSS receiver phase clock and ambiguities parameters. The mathematical model for the three GNSS PPP techniques is developed by considering the current full GNSS constellations. In addition, the current limitations of the GNSS PPP techniques are discussed. Static post-processing results for a number of IGS MGEX GNSS stations are presented to investigate the contribution of the newly GNSS system observations and the newly developed GNSS PPP techniques and its limitations. The results indicate that the additional Galileo and BeiDou observations have a marginal effect on the positioning accuracy and convergence time compared with the existence combined GPS/GLONASS PPP. However, reference to GPS PPP, the contribution of BeiDou observations can be considered geographically dependent. In addition, the results show that the BSSD PPP models slightly enhance the convergence time compared with other PPP techniques. However, both the standard un-differenced and the developed multiple ambiguity datum techniques present comparable positioning accuracy and convergence time due to the lack of code and phase-based satellite clock products and the mathematical correlation between the positioning and ambiguity parameters.