Uniting Global Efforts to Calibrate GNSS Antennas: Models, analyses and pilot results

Research output: Contribution to conferenceSlides to presentationResearch

Authors

Research Organisations

External Research Organisations

  • Topcon Positioning Systems, Livermore
  • National Geodetic Survey (NGS)
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Details

Original languageEnglish
Publication statusE-pub ahead of print - 1 Jul 2024
EventIGS Symposium and Workshop 2024: 30 years of IGS - University of Bern (UniBE), Bern, Switzerland
Duration: 1 Jul 20245 Jul 2024
https://igs.org/workshop/2024/

Workshop

WorkshopIGS Symposium and Workshop 2024
Abbreviated titleIGS2024
Country/TerritorySwitzerland
CityBern
Period1 Jul 20245 Jul 2024
Internet address

Abstract

Calibrations of GNSS receiver antennas to compute phase center corrections (PCCs) is an important product for reference frame determination. Research also demonstrates that PCCs affect position accuracy, troposphere modeling, and clock estimation. In recent years, multiple institutions have started calibrating receiver antennas, with a desire to contribute their PCCs to the IGS ANTEX. These institutions have a large variety of environments, equipment, software, and computation techniques. Thus it is important to verify the consistency of calibration results before the PCCs can be validly combined into a master IGS ANTEX file.

With support from the IGS Antenna Committee, the authors organized a “ring calibration” or “ringcal” experiment to directly compare results from multiple techniques. The campaign aims to understand technique differences, identify the degree of agreement, improve the consistency of calibration results, and develop a strategy and quality assessment of carrier phase and code calibrations.

Towards these goals, six antennas were circulated to 9 different institutions worldwide, for individual calibration. Participants shared their multi-GNSS phase calibrations in ANTEX format, as well as detailed information on their equipment and technique. This contribution reviews the current status of this campaign, and provides new comparison and evaluation results for carrier phase patterns.

Assessment of the ringcal results is obviously crucial to this campaign, yet to date there are no community-accepted comparison maths or software to validly compare and analyze PCCs. The authors developed new formulae for PCC comparison and PCO computation, and new metrics to summarize the 3D nature of each calibration. The authors also introduce new open-source software to implement these strategies and compare calibration values, numerically and graphically. We use the current software to compare the ringcal data, and call upon the community to help with additional development.

Ultimately, the impact of different PCC definitions on the IGS station positions and reference frame determination is of utmost importance. We call on the IGS community to provide feedback on preferred analysis methods and assistance in studying the impact of these PCCs on IGS products and services.

Keywords

    GNSS, antenna calibration, antenna phase centre variations, antenna phase centre offsets

Research Area (based on ÖFOS 2012)

  • TECHNICAL SCIENCES
  • Environmental Engineering, Applied Geosciences
  • Geodesy, Surveying
  • Satellite geodesy

Sustainable Development Goals

Cite this

Uniting Global Efforts to Calibrate GNSS Antennas: Models, analyses and pilot results. / Kersten, Tobias; Sutyagin, Igor; Bilich, Andria et al.
2024. IGS Symposium and Workshop 2024, Bern, Switzerland.

Research output: Contribution to conferenceSlides to presentationResearch

Kersten, T, Sutyagin, I, Bilich, A & Schön, S 2024, 'Uniting Global Efforts to Calibrate GNSS Antennas: Models, analyses and pilot results', IGS Symposium and Workshop 2024, Bern, Switzerland, 1 Jul 2024 - 5 Jul 2024. https://doi.org/10.15488/17846
Kersten, T., Sutyagin, I., Bilich, A., & Schön, S. (2024). Uniting Global Efforts to Calibrate GNSS Antennas: Models, analyses and pilot results. IGS Symposium and Workshop 2024, Bern, Switzerland. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.15488/17846
Kersten T, Sutyagin I, Bilich A, Schön S. Uniting Global Efforts to Calibrate GNSS Antennas: Models, analyses and pilot results. 2024. IGS Symposium and Workshop 2024, Bern, Switzerland. Epub 2024 Jul 1. doi: 10.15488/17846
Kersten, Tobias ; Sutyagin, Igor ; Bilich, Andria et al. / Uniting Global Efforts to Calibrate GNSS Antennas : Models, analyses and pilot results. IGS Symposium and Workshop 2024, Bern, Switzerland.
Download
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AU - Sutyagin, Igor

AU - Bilich, Andria

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N2 - Calibrations of GNSS receiver antennas to compute phase center corrections (PCCs) is an important product for reference frame determination. Research also demonstrates that PCCs affect position accuracy, troposphere modeling, and clock estimation. In recent years, multiple institutions have started calibrating receiver antennas, with a desire to contribute their PCCs to the IGS ANTEX. These institutions have a large variety of environments, equipment, software, and computation techniques. Thus it is important to verify the consistency of calibration results before the PCCs can be validly combined into a master IGS ANTEX file.With support from the IGS Antenna Committee, the authors organized a “ring calibration” or “ringcal” experiment to directly compare results from multiple techniques. The campaign aims to understand technique differences, identify the degree of agreement, improve the consistency of calibration results, and develop a strategy and quality assessment of carrier phase and code calibrations.Towards these goals, six antennas were circulated to 9 different institutions worldwide, for individual calibration. Participants shared their multi-GNSS phase calibrations in ANTEX format, as well as detailed information on their equipment and technique. This contribution reviews the current status of this campaign, and provides new comparison and evaluation results for carrier phase patterns.Assessment of the ringcal results is obviously crucial to this campaign, yet to date there are no community-accepted comparison maths or software to validly compare and analyze PCCs. The authors developed new formulae for PCC comparison and PCO computation, and new metrics to summarize the 3D nature of each calibration. The authors also introduce new open-source software to implement these strategies and compare calibration values, numerically and graphically. We use the current software to compare the ringcal data, and call upon the community to help with additional development.Ultimately, the impact of different PCC definitions on the IGS station positions and reference frame determination is of utmost importance. We call on the IGS community to provide feedback on preferred analysis methods and assistance in studying the impact of these PCCs on IGS products and services.

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KW - GNSS

KW - antenna calibration

KW - antenna phase centre variations

KW - antenna phase centre offsets

KW - GNSS

KW - antenna calibration

KW - antenna phase centre variations

KW - antenna phase centre offsets

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M3 - Slides to presentation

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