Received: 23 May 2019 Revised: 23 September 2019 Accepted: 24 September 2019

DOI: 10.1002/navi.345

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

An overview of the effects of out-of-band interference on

GNSS receivers

Christopher J. Hegarty1 | Dan Bobyn2 | Joe Grabowski3 | A.J. Van Dierendonck4

1
The MITRE Corporation, Bedford,
Massachusetts, USA
Abstract
2
Dan Bobyn Engineering Ltd, Calgary, This paper addresses the wide range of mechanisms through which out-of-
Alberta, Canada band interference can disrupt the functioning of GNSS receivers. These mecha-
3
Zeta Associates, Fairfax, Virginia, USA nisms include saturation and desensitization of front-end low noise amplifiers,
4
AJ Systems, Los Altos, California, USA mixers and other circuitry; reciprocal mixing effects that arise from the fact
Correspondence
that receivers cannot generate a perfect tone to down-convert the desired sig-
Christopher J. Hegarty, The MITRE nals; intermodulation products; aliasing of out-of-band emissions that remain
Corporation, Bedford, MA, USA.
after filtering into the receiver's passband; and the reception of in-band
Email: chegarty@mitre.org
(to GNSS) emissions that are always present due to imperfections in the signal
generation and filtering of the interfering system. These mechanisms are
described in detail and mitigation approaches for each are discussed.

1 | INTRODUCTION receiver susceptibility to out-of-band interference are

In recent years, there has been a growing awareness of
the potential for disruption of GNSS receiver operation
due to strong out-of-band interference. This awareness
has arisen, in part, due to ongoing efforts in the United
States and elsewhere to partially satisfy the demand for
wireless broadband by placing new wireless broadband
systems in bands adjacent to GNSS frequencies, which
were previously used for other purposes (see, eg, previous
literature1,2).
This paper addresses a wide range of mechanisms
through which out-of-band interference sources can
disrupt the functioning of GNSS receivers. These mech-
anisms include saturation and desensitization of front-
end low noise amplifiers, mixers and other circuitry;
reciprocal mixing effects that arise from the fact that
receivers cannot generate a perfect tone to down-
convert the desired signals; intermodulation products;
aliasing of out-of-band emissions that remain after fil-
tering into the receiver's passband; and the reception of
in-band (to GNSS) emissions that are always present
due to imperfections in the signal generation and filter-
ing of the interfering system. These mechanisms are
described in detail, and mitigation approaches to reduce
outlined.
The paper is organized as follows. To facilitate later
discussion, a description of a representative GNSS
receiver front-end is presented. In this section, key com-
ponents of the front-end with respect to out-of-band
interference susceptibility are identified and described.
The following section discusses the variety of mecha-
nisms through which out-of-band interference can
impact receiver performance. The penultimate
section details mitigation approaches to decrease receiver
susceptibility to out-of-band interference, and the paper
concludes with a short summary.
2 | RECEIVER FRONT-END
2.1 | Overview
Figure 1 depicts a representative radio-frequency
(RF) front-end design for a modern digital GNSS receiver.
This design, which is based upon a typical configuration
for an aviation receiver, will be used to illustrate the vari-
ous effects of out-of-band interference that are discussed
throughout this paper.

NAVIGATION. 2020;67:143–161. wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/navi © 2020 Institute of Navigation 143

144
FIGURE 1 Representative GNSS receiver front-end
The active antenna unit (top portion of Figure 1)
includes a passive patch antenna element tuned to the
operating frequency, limiter (to provide lightning protec-
tion), two dielectric resonator (ceramic) filters, and a low
noise amplifier (LNA). The active antenna unit is con-
nected to the receiver via a length of cable. The receiver
unit itself includes an input filter, comparable to those in
the antenna, a limiter, LNA, a pre-mixer filter, followed
by a mixer to down-convert the received signal using a
local oscillator (LO) to some convenient intermediate fre-
quency (IF). Following down-conversion, the IF signal is
filtered by a surface acoustic wave (SAW) filter and
amplified for levels suitable to feed an analog-to-digital
converter (A/D). The A/D digitizes the signal for further
signal processing. Automatic gain control (AGC) ensures
a proper A/D input signal level.
It is important to note that the design in Figure 1 is
only illustrative. Across the entire set of fielded GNSS
receivers, the designs vary greatly (see, eg, Van
Dierendonck3). Some configurations use passive anten-
nas (ie, the external antenna unit only contains the pas-
sive antenna element in a protective casing, or radome,
with a connector). The amount of filtering within active
antennas may vary tremendously from product to prod-
uct, and the amount of filtering and filter technologies
used within the receiver unit may also vary tremen-
dously. Some receivers may use two or three stages of
down-conversion versus the single-stage illustrated.
Many receivers sample or subsample a single IF signal as
shown in Figure 1 using A/D techniques, whereas others
use a pair of mixers in the final analog down-conversion
to bring inphase and quadraphase components of the
HEGARTY ET AL.
received signal fully to baseband before separately sam-
pling each of these two paths. Lastly, Figure 1 only
depicts the front-end for one center frequency. A receiver
processing GNSS signals upon multiple frequencies
would require additional front-end hardware to imple-
ment parallel signal paths.
2.2 | Components
Despite the wide variation, noted above, in GNSS receiver
designs, the basic components depicted in Figure 1 are
found in virtually all receivers. The behavior of these
components influences the overall performance of the
receiver in the presence of strong out-of-band
interference.
2.2.1 | Passive antenna element
Many GNSS antenna designs (eg, microstrip patch or
stacked-patch) are resonant at one or more desired fre-
quencies, whereas others (eg, conical spiral) are broad-
band. Resonant antennas can provide substantial
attenuation to far out-of-band signals. The gain pattern
and polarization characteristics of the antenna are also
important parameters since they influence the received
power levels for both the desired signals and interference.
It should be noted that performance characteristics of an
antenna may be significantly different when the antenna
is installed and operated as compared with when it is
measured in a test chamber by the manufacturer.
HEGARTY ET AL.
2.2.2 | Limiter
Limiters are implemented in most high-quality active
antennas and receivers. A typical design uses a shunt PIN
diode to protect subsequent components against high
input power levels, lightning, and electrostatic discharge
events. (PIN refers to a semiconductor with p-type and
n-type outer layers and an intrinsic layer in-between.)
Depending on the applied RF power level, the device
appears as an open circuit at low power levels, somewhat
resistive at moderate power levels as the diode enters for-
ward bias conditions, and a very low impedance at high
power levels that cause high forward bias. While inher-
ently nonlinear, the levels required to enter the nonlinear
region are normally far higher than those occurring dur-
ing interference events.
2.2.3 | RF and IF filters
A wide variety of RF and IF filters are used across the
enormous number of fielded GNSS receivers. The most
commonly used filter technologies are described in detail
in the later section of this paper on mitigation
approaches.
RF filters isolate the input spectrum to the desired
passband, rejecting noise and signals from outside the
passband. Important system level characteristics include
rejection at known interference signal frequencies and
rejection at image frequencies of the receiver for both
interference signals and thermal noise.
IF filters isolate the channel spectrum to a much
tighter bandwidth than the RF filters are capable of, thus
ensuring close-in interference sources are rejected, as
well as minimizing the noise bandwidth of the analog
signal processing stages prior to the A/D.
Often, the most susceptible region across the band-
width of a receiver is that region just outside the
IF passband of the receiver. Here, while the IF
filter would reject the signal, the RF filters have only
weak attenuation so that even low level interference
signals will pass virtually unattenuated through the RF
and IF stages before the IF filter. Active stages just
prior to the IF filter then risk being driven into
saturation.
2.2.4 | LNA
Current LNA devices tend to use silicon-germanium
(SiGe) heterojunction bipolar transistor (HBT) technol-
ogy in either discrete or monolithic microwave integrated
circuit (MMIC) packages. Gallium arsenide (GaAs)
devices remain popular in both discrete and MMIC for-
mats. When the LNA is part of a larger scale integrated
145
receiver, SiGe, CMOS, or more recently combined SiGe-
CMOS technologies are used.
Discrete devices have better noise figure performance,
allow tailoring of other important performance parame-
ters (gain, compression point, etc) to the application, and
are often preferred for low-volume, high-precision
receivers. However, there are a large number of MMIC
LNA devices optimized for GNSS frequencies which offer
size and complexity advantages over discrete devices. A
single device has between 15 and 20 dB of gain at L band,
so it is necessary to cascade two devices to obtain the
LNA gain blocks described here. For this configuration,
the first device would be chosen for optimal noise figure
whereas the second would be chosen for compression
characteristics.
As will be discussed later, LNAs operate in a nomi-
nally linear manner for small input voltages, but
become increasingly nonlinear in the presence of
increasingly strong interference. LNA nonlinearity is
commonly characterized by specifications for the 1-dB
compression point and third-order intercept point,
which will be described later. Typical GNSS LNA out-
put 1-dB compression points range from 0 to +10 dBm.
The output third-order intercept point for a typical
active device (LNA or mixer) is 10 to 15 dB higher than
the output 1-dB compression point.
2.2.5 | Mixers
Virtually, all mixers used in current receiver designs are
active mixer devices in either MMIC form, or within
larger scale receiver integrated circuits (ICs). These
devices use a variety of mixer configurations ranging
from nonlinear amplification in single active GaAs or
HBT transistors to Gilbert cell4 analog multiplier configu-
rations and are integrated with gain stages to overcome
the inherent loss of the mixing process and to allow low
level local oscillator (LO) signal levels to be used.
Basically, any device that has an input/output trans-
fer function (VRF/VIF) that can be modulated or multi-
plied by a voltage at a third terminal (VLO) will contain a
component VIF = K × VRF × VLO at its output terminals.
(K will vary among devices.) Mixing results are illustrated
below assuming sinusoidal waves for both the RF and LO
signals:
V IF ðt Þ = K × V RF ðt Þ × V LO ðt Þ
= K × V RF cosð2πf RF t Þ × V LO cosð2πf LO t Þ
1 ð1Þ
= K × V RF × V LO ðcos½2π ðf RF + f LO Þt 
2
+ cos½2π ðf RF − f LO Þt Þ:
146
The IF output of the mixer contains components at
the sum and difference of the LO and RF frequencies.
For down-conversion, it is the signal at the difference fre-
quency that is desired, and this signal is isolated at the
output of the mixer using a low-pass or band-pass filter.
This relationship holds for numerous mixer
implementations ranging from weak modulation of
amplifier bias levels by an LO signal to complete high
level on/off switching of the signal path at the LO rate.
Using switches for the active device is efficient and sim-
ple where the implementation can be a single switch
using a diode or transistor. More complex arrangements
of devices, including pairs of switches driven in opposi-
tion with up to four devices in a balanced ring arrange-
ment, can be used to provide advantages in cancelling
unwanted spurious mixer products. The Gilbert cell4 is a
very commonly used integrated mixer configuration that
implements a full four-quadrant analog multiplier.
From an interference perspective, active mixers typi-
cally have slightly lower 1-dB compression (P1dB) points,
−10 dBm to 0 dBm referenced to their output, and
accordingly lower third-order intermodulation (IP3)
behavior as amplifiers and are analyzed using the same
techniques.
2.2.6 | Local oscillators
Phase locked loops (PLLs) are normally used to generate
the local oscillator signals. In recent designs, the PLL
implementations in integrated devices contain all the dig-
ital and analog components. Two flavors of PLLs exist:
those with fractional frequency dividers and the more
common implementations with integer dividers. Each
generates a clean LO signal using a voltage-controlled
oscillator (VCO), but some attention must be given to
ensure that the reference frequency sidebands are ade-
quately suppressed. For fractional-divider based PLLs,
this can get quite complicated.
Generally speaking, frequency sidebands can occur in
one of two ways. First, as shown in Figure 2, PLLs effec-
tively generate their output signal by taking an external
frequency source (eg, a crystal oscillator), dividing it
down to some common reference frequency, usually in
HEGARTY ET AL.
the tens of kHz region, and essentially multiplying it
back up again to the necessary LO frequency. As the
phase detector utilizes narrow impulses to control the
VCO frequency, remnants of this reference frequency
and its harmonics modulate the LO signal and show up
as symmetrical sidebands at the PLL output. This fre-
quency modulation is transferred to the received GNSS
signal through the mixing process. However, this is not
generally a concern because it occurs at very high fre-
quencies relative to the baseband signal processing of
GNSS information. It is simply a matter of good design
practice to keep the level of these to the −50 or −60 dBc
range.
The second type of LO sidebands occur due to inter-
nal leakage within the PLL devices or due to inadequate
isolation around the PLL circuits. These spurious signals
can also modulate the LO signal resulting in symmetri-
cal sidebands. Again, good receiver design practices need
to be employed to keep these spurious signals to reason-
ably low values, which are on the order of −60 to
−80 dBc.
Figure 3 is a measured spectrum from a GNSS
receiver local oscillator which shows both types of side-
bands on a GNSS receiver LO signal. The reference fre-
quency sidebands begin at 250 kHz and decrease with
each integer related harmonic. Leakage sidebands can be
seen at 2.5 MHz, about 3 MHz, and at the receiver refer-
ence clock frequency of 9.96 MHz.
Direct digital synthesizers (DDS) are becoming a com-
mon method to generate LO signals. DDS signals are gen-
erated by digital means and converted to an analog
waveform prior to being output. They can achieve
extremely fine frequency resolution but are rich in spuri-
ous signals, which can occur at virtually any frequency,
albeit at low levels. This means that all effects including
those affecting GNSS signal processing, receiver self-
interference, and reciprocal mixing of input interference
must be considered when evaluating a DDS LO.
2.2.7 | AGC amplifiers
There exist many different ways to vary the gain of IF
stages as necessary to maintain a suitable signal level at
FIGURE 2 Typical local oscillator design
HEGARTY ET AL.
FIGURE 3 PLL-generated GNSS receiver LO spectrum
the input of the A/D converter. Design choices for this
function can have a profound effect on overall receiver
susceptibility to interference.
Older style, simple receivers used one bit, hard limit-
ing, which is not really AGC in that there is no feedback
and control mechanism. The receive path signal is simply
amplified until it clips and the clipped signal is then sam-
pled as a single bit digital representation of the input sig-
nal and processed accordingly. This works, but the
receive signals are degraded in the process.
Most modern GNSS receivers use multi-bit A/D
devices to digitize the input signal. This requires linear
amplification in the received signal path with the ability
to center the level at the A/D to the required receiver set-
point. In the analog domain, an AGC amplifier, or more
properly, a variable gain amplifier (VGA) is used for this
purpose. Control of the VGA is by an AGC loop, with
feedback coming from the GNSS signal processing
blocks.
VGAs can be implemented by controlling the bias of
a simple transistor amplifier or by more complex
implementations that contain several stages of amplifiers
and complex networks to idealize the gain control curve.
Figure 4 shows examples of receiver gain measurements
for two receivers. The first receiver uses simple transistor
bias control and a second a dedicated linear-in-dB RF
integrated circuit (RFIC) device.
While the overall gain control range is similar, the
simple transistor bias control has a far less ideal gain con-
trol curve. Worse yet, in the context of interference per-
formance is the behavior of the compression point of the
VGA stage. The compression point is a function of the
bias level, being high for high bias current levels and low
for low bias current levels. Strong interference levels at
147
F I G U R E 4 Normalized receiver gain as a function of VGA
voltage [Color figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com and
www.ion.org]
the input of the VGA (which would take control of the
AGC loop if it were high enough) would cause the AGC
loop to reduce the VGA gain by reducing the VGA bias.
This is a situation of high interference levels and low
compression points and is therefore problematic not only
for interference that falls inside the IF band but also for
out-of-band interference in receivers with IF filters that
do not have sharp passband-to-stopband transitions or in
receivers where the AGC amplifier precedes the IF filter.
RFIC devices strive to implement a far more ideal
gain control curve than that of a simple transistor under
bias gain control. However, depending on the particular
implementation, they will also have other parameter var-
iations as the gain control is varied. An idealized model
of a VGA would contain a fixed amplifier plus variable
attenuator. If the variable attenuator is in front of the
amplifier, the VGA noise figure would be a function of
the control voltage and the output compression point
would remain constant. This is the preferred model for a
GNSS receiver. However, some devices incorporate some
gain prior to the variable attenuator making the compos-
ite device compression point a function of gain, which is
the main weakness of the simple transistor circuit.
3 | OUT-OF-BAND
INTERFERENCE C OUPLING
MECHANISMS
3.1 | Saturation and desensitization
Many GNSS receiver components may be accurately
modeled using idealized models and linear system theory
in the absence of strong interference. For instance, con-
sider the simple LNA system model shown in Figure 5.
The LNA takes an input voltage, x(t), which is typically
the filtered output of a passive antenna element, and
148 HEGARTY ET AL.

where R is the reference load resistance across which the

voltage is measured, presumed to be 50 Ω. The a2 and a4
coefficients were set to zero, as is usual practice, assum-
ing an input-output voltage function with odd symmetry.
The a1 and a3 coefficients were selected to achieve a 1-dB
input compression point of −22.2 dBm, an output third-
FIGURE 5 Low noise amplifier system model
order intercept point of +20 dBm, and a nominal gain of
34.5 dB, which along with an assumption of 4.9 dB
provides an output voltage, y(t), with a nominal power limiter and filter losses would result in an overall active
gain of G (in linear units). In the absence of interference, antenna assembly compliant with relevant specifications
the LNA is well-modeled as ideal, ie, its input-output for active airborne GNSS antennas from RTCA.6 The a5
voltage characteristics may be accurately described as coefficient was selected solely to achieve a “flat” output
voltage for the maximum input voltage shown in the
y = a1 x ð2Þ figure, as would be expected for a saturating amplifier.
pffiffiffiffi The input-output power characteristic of the modeled
where a1 = G. LNA is shown in Figure 7. The figure shows the 1-dB
For large input voltages, the LNA begins to saturate compression point (referenced to both input and output
and is no longer well-modeled by Equation (2). A trun- powers), where the output level of the LNA is 1-dB less
cated Taylor series expansion is often used (see, eg, than it would have been if the LNA maintained its nomi-
Pozar5) as a more accurate model for the output voltage: nal linear gain characteristic (ie, output power equals
input power plus 34.5 dB) indefinitely as input power is
X
N increased. The output power at the 1-dB compression
y= ai x i : ð3Þ point for this particular LNA is +11.3 dBm, which is
i=1
slightly higher than the earlier-mentioned 0 to +10 dBm
For example, Figure 6 shows the voltage input-output level that is more typical for mass-market GNSS LNAs.
characteristics of an LNA modeled using Equation (3) If the input voltage to the antenna LNA consists of
with N = 5 and the following coefficients: just the desired GNSS signals and noise, saturation does
not occur. Prior to digitization and correlation, the GNSS
a1 = 53:088 ðunitlessÞ signals are buried by the noise, so it suffices to focus
a2 = 0 attention on only the noise levels to understand the over-
 
a3 = −997490=R volts − 2 ð4Þ all signal levels seen throughout the front-end. For a typi-
cal noise density of −201.5 dBW/Hz referenced to the
a4 = 0
  output of the passive antenna terminals, the noise power
a5 = 6:5e9=R2 volts −4
referenced to this point over the final IF bandwidth of

F I G U R E 6 Input-output voltage characteristic for modeled F I G U R E 7 Input-output power characteristic for modeled
airborne antenna LNA [Color figure can be viewed airborne antenna LNA [Color figure can be viewed
at wileyonlinelibrary.com and www.ion.org] at wileyonlinelibrary.com and www.ion.org]
HEGARTY ET AL.
20 MHz bandwidth is −98.5 dBm. Figure 1 indicates the
noise level for various points in the front-end. The LNA
in the active antenna sees approximately −101 dBm at its
input, and the output power of the entire active antenna
assembly is −68.9 dBm. After a 10-dB cable loss and 2.7
dB losses for a filter and limiter, the first receiver LNA
sees −81.6 dBm at its input. Both the mixer input and
AGC VGA input are at −53.8 dBm, the final amplifier
input is at −30 dBm.
In the presence of out-of-band interference with
increasing strength, one or more of the active devices in
the receiver modeled in Figure 1 will at some point begin
to saturate. If the interference is far away in frequency
from the desired band, saturation of the first LNA within
the active antenna is most likely. The amplifiers and
mixers further downstream will be provided some addi-
tional protection by the filtering stages that precede
them, provided that the accumulated filter attenuation
outpaces the accumulated gain as the signal moves along
the front-end. For out-of-band interference that is closer
to the desired band, the later stages are more likely to sat-
urate first.
When saturation occurs, there are several deleterious
effects on receiver operation that are together referred to
as desensitization. First, the gain provided to the desired
signal decreases. Importantly, in the presence of a strong
out-of-band interference source (often referred to as a
blocker), the gain provided by an active device to the
desired, in-band signal is less than that provided to the
interference source as may be observed by evaluating
Equation (3) in the presence of the combination of a
strong tone (interference) at one frequency and a weak
tone (desired signal) at another.7,8 Second, as is well
known, the output of the nonlinearity is distorted.9 For
non-CW interference, the resulting interference power
spectrum is generally spread over a wider range of fre-
quencies, which often results in more energy entering
into the receiver passband. The receiver simultaneously
suffers a decrease in recovered power from the desired
signal. Third, the overall noise figure of the receiver
front-end degrades due to the diminishing desired signal
gain, as well as due to an increase in the active device's
individual noise figure. The latter factor occurs as a result
of two mechanisms: (1) in saturation, the operating con-
ditions of the device are no longer as intended to mini-
mize noise figure, and (2) the nonlinear behavior results
in the conversion of noise generated at other frequencies
within the device to the desired band.7,10,11
3.2 | Harmonics and intermodulation
The same nonlinearities in LNAs and active mixers that
cause receiver desensitization can yield harmonics and
149
intermodulation products due to the presence of strong
out-of-band interference at their inputs.5 For instance,
consider the behavior of an active component with the
input-output characteristic of Equation (3) when the
input is a sinusoid:
P
N
y = ai x i
i=1
ð5Þ
P
N
= ai ½cosðω0 t Þi :
i=1
A linear device, for which ai = 0 for all i > 1, would
only output a sinusoid at the input frequency. For a
nonlinear device, the higher-order terms in (5) give rise
to sinusoids at integer multiples of the input frequencies,
which are referred to as harmonics. Harmonics generated
by nonlinear devices in GNSS receivers are not generally
problematic since only interference signals that are some-
what close to the GNSS center frequency will survive
front-end filtering, and the harmonics of such frequen-
cies will be far outside the passband of downstream
filtering.
When signals at two or more frequencies are present
at the input of a nonlinear device, then intermodulation
products result. For instance, with two tones at the input,
the output of a nonlinear device that is well-modeled by
Equation (3) is
P
N
y = ai x i
i=1
ð6Þ
P
N
= ai ½cosðω1 t Þ + cosðω2 t Þi :
i=1
Using trigonometric identities, it may readily be dem-
onstrated that the i = 2 output term includes energy at
four frequencies referred to as the second-order intermod-
ulation products: 2ω1, 2ω2, and ω1 ± ω2, and the i =
3 term includes energy at six frequencies (third-order
intermodulation products): 3ω1, 2ω1 ± ω2, 2ω2 ± ω1, and
3ω2. The i = 3 term is commonly the most troublesome
within GNSS or other mass-market receivers, since the
two frequencies 2ω1 − ω2 and 2ω2 − ω1 can fall within
the receiver passband for strong interference at two fre-
quencies that are sufficiently close to the desired signal
center frequency to survive earlier band-pass filtering.
Importantly, the third-order intermodulation products
grow at three times the rate of growth of the level of the
input tones, ie, for every 1-dB increase in the input, there
is a 3-dB increase in the output third-order intermodula-
tion product level.
If the interference of interest is a modulated signal
and not just a tone, the analysis approach above must be
modified accordingly. For the same reasons mentioned
above, third-order intermodulation products are of the
greatest concern and will be the focus of attention for the
150
remaining discussion. Noting that the input-output char-
acteristics are virtually unchanged for input power levels
below −20 dBm by truncating the Taylor series to N =
3, and as noted earlier, the a2 coefficient is normally very
small for devices exhibiting odd-symmetry, and here, we
focus on the simpler input-output voltage model:
y = a1 x + a3 x 3
with the input voltage presumed to be well-modeled as a
Gaussian, wide sense stationary random process.
The output voltage autocorrelation may be deter-
mined as
Ry ðτÞ  E ½yðt + τÞyðt Þ
= E ½ða1 x ðt + τÞ + a3 x 3 ðt + τÞÞða1 x ðt Þ + a3 x 3 ðt ÞÞ
= ða1 2 + 6a1 a3 σ x 2 + 9a3 σ x 4 ÞRx ðτÞ + 6a3 2 Rx 3 ðτÞ,
where Rx(τ) is the input voltage autocorrelation and
σ x2 = Rx(0) is the variance of x(t) (ie, input power aside
from a possible scale factor for a non-unity resistance
value).
From Equation (8), the following expression may be
derived to relate the output power spectrum, Sy(f), of the
LNA to its input power spectrum, Sx(f):
 
Sy ð f Þ = a1 2 + 6a1 a3 σ x 2 + 9a3 σ x 4 Sx ð f Þ
+ 6a3 2 Sx ð f Þ*Sx ð f Þ*Sx ð f Þ,
where * is the convolution operator. The reader is cau-
tioned that Equation (9) only applies for signals that are
noise-like in the sense that they are well-modeled as
Gaussian and wide-sense stationary. Modulated signals
are most often cyclostationary and their cyclostationarity
may result in a very different power spectrum at the out-
put of a nonlinearity. For instance, bandlimited noise fed
through a square law device will exhibit a power spec-
trum at the output that is the input power spectrum con-
volved with itself, as can be predicted from a derivation
similar to that leading up to Equation (9). A binary phase
shift keyed signal fed through the same square law
device, however, will not have its power spectrum spread.
The squaring in this case will result in the wipe-off of the
data and a pure tone will result.
As an example of an interference problem due to
third-order intermodulation products, consider the
impact on the receiver model of Figure 1 in the presence
of a pair of equal-power, 5-MHz bandwidth interfering
signals centered at 1528.8 MHz and 1552.7 MHz. Using
the attenuation characteristics in Figure 8 for the
HEGARTY ET AL.
ð7Þ
F I G U R E 8 Three-pole ceramic preselection filter attenuation
(24 MHz 1-dB bandwidth, 33 MHz 3-dB bandwidth) [Color figure
ð8Þ can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com and www.ion.org]
preselection filter (ie, the filter immediately after the pas-
sive antenna in Figure 1), Figure 9 shows the input and
output power spectrum of the active antenna LNA if the
two interference signals are seen at equal levels at the
output of the passive antenna element with a total power
of −45 dBm. (Note that we presume, for this illustration,
that the passive antenna element equally attenuates each
interfering signal, whereas in practice it would likely pro-
vide more attenuation to the lower frequency signal.) The
preselection filter attenuates both interfering signals, but
ð9Þ the lower-frequency signal that is further from the
desired signal is attenuated more. At the LNA input, a
total power level of −57.5 dBm is seen. This level is suffi-
ciently low that the LNA does not experience a problem
with saturation and the output power spectrum looks
identical to the input spectrum except that it exhibits a
34.5 dB power increase due to the LNA gain.
If the interference is seen at a stronger level, the LNA
will saturate and produce intermodulation products. This
condition is shown in Figure 10. In this case, the interfer-
ing signals are received at a power level of −25 dBm at
the output terminals of the passive antenna element.
After the preselection filter and limiter, the LNA sees an
input level of −37.6 dBm. A third-order intermodulation
product is clearly seen centered at 2 × 1552.7-1528.8 =
1576.6 MHz, very close to the desired signal center fre-
quency of 1575.42 MHz. The intermodulation product
raises the noise floor a significant amount, and would
result in a reduction in the signal-to-noise ratio thus
degrading the performance of the receiver. If the received
signal is followed further through the front-end model of
Figure 1, it can be seen that the two additional stages of
filtering before the next gain stage will greatly suppress
the lower-frequency interference signal preventing the
HEGARTY ET AL. 151

F I G U R E 9 Input (top) and output

(bottom) power spectrum of active antenna
LNA; total interference power at antenna
output port is −45 dBm, LNA input power is
−57.5 dBm (LNA in linear region) [Color figure
can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com and
www.ion.org]

generation of additional intermodulation products in the
receiver LNA or mixer. The original intermodulation
product, however, is now in the passband of the receiver
and is not attenuated.
In laboratory testing of GNSS avionics in the pres-
ence of emulated interference from a proposed terres-
trial broadband network, intermodulation products
consistent with the theory described above were
observed. Figure 11 shows the power spectrum of the
emulated signals corresponding to the use of two Long
Term Evolution (LTE) carriers in the 1525 to
1559 MHz band as shaped to emulate attenuation from
filtering within an active antenna. Two originally pro-
posed spectrum deployment phases were emulated. For
phase 1 (blue), each carrier was modulated by a
5-MHz LTE signal. For phase 2, each carrier had a
10-MHz bandwidth. The details of the test setup are
provided in Appendix A. Figure 12 shows the power
spectrum of the LNA output voltage, and for compari-
son, the scaled power spectrum of the desired
(GPS C/A-code) signal (with arbitrary power scaling to
facilitate viewing).

F I G U R E 1 0 Input (top) and output

(bottom) power spectrum of modeled LNA;
interference power at antenna output port is
−25 dBm, LNA input power is −37.6 dBm (LNA
in compression) [Color figure can be viewed
at wileyonlinelibrary.com and www.ion.org]
152
3.3 | Reciprocal mixing
Traditional reciprocal mixing issues in communications
receivers degrade receiver sensitivity in the presence of
close-in interference signals.10,12 Phase noise and/or spu-
rious signals (spurs) on the local oscillator (LO) signal of
the receiver can translate the interference energy to the
IF band of the receiver. While this is a particular concern
for communications receivers where high level signals
will occur in channels immediately adjacent to the oper-
ating channel, the same effect can mix interference sig-
nals at nearby frequencies into the IF band of a GNSS
receiver.
Referring to the representative receiver block dia-
gram of Figure 1, an ideal receiver will accept a signal at
HEGARTY ET AL.
F I G U R E 1 1 Spectrally shaped broadband
interference [Color figure can be viewed
at wileyonlinelibrary.com and www.ion.org]
F I G U R E 1 2 Intermodulation products
seen in hardware testing [Color figure can be
viewed ato wileyonlinelibrary.com and www.
ion.org]
the receive frequency, fIN, mix it with an LO at fLO to
generate an IF output signal at the difference between
the two frequencies, fIF. If an interference signal that is
just out-of-band appears at the receiver input and passes
through the RF filters with little attenuation, it will also
mix with the LO. Ideally, after being mixed to IF, this
interference signal will fall outside the IF bandwidth and
be rejected.
However, if the LO contains spurious energy at some
offset frequency ΔfSPUR above or below the local oscillator
frequency fLO, then out-of-band interference signals that
appear at the input of the receiver meeting the criteria
ΔfSPUR =|fIN − fINT| will mix with this spur to generate
interference signals which also fall inside the receiver IF
bandwidth.
HEGARTY ET AL.
FIGURE 13 Illustration of
reciprocal mixing
This effect is illustrated in Figure 13. The mixer is a
multiplier in the time domain. Thus, the mixer output
spectrum may be computed as the convolution of the
input RF and LO spectra in the frequency domain. If the
frequency separation between the LO spur and the LO
intended frequency is equal to (or close to) the frequency
separation between the interference source and desired
band, then after the mixer some of the undesired interfer-
ence energy will combine with the desired signals in the
IF band.
As a result of the convolution of signals within the
mixer, the relative amplitude of the spur in the LO signal
is maintained for the reciprocal mixed product. The
resulting interference level at IF may thus be computed
in a straightforward manner, as shown in the following
example. Consider a high power interference source at
fINT = 1555 MHz entering the antenna at −30 dBm along
with an L1 GNSS signal at a power of −130 dBm. Assume
the local oscillator is on the low side of the receive band
and contains a spur at an offset of 20 MHz below the
local oscillator frequency, at a relative level of −60 dBc.
In this case, the spur will translate the interference
source to the same IF that receives the GNSS signal, to
generate an in-band IF interference signal.
Using the reference receiver diagram presented previ-
ously and assuming that the three pole filters reject the
1555 MHz signal by an additional 6 dB each, the signal
and interference amplitudes at the mixer output can be
calculated as shown in Table 1.
The mixer provides an effective +15 dB gain to the in-
band signal. However, since the LO spur responsible for
the reciprocal mixed product is at −60 dBc, the interfer-
ence signal experiences an effective gain of +15 dB to
60 dBc = −45 dB. The resulting I/S is around 16 dB. Even
though the interference level used in the example is high,
TABLE 1 Reciprocal mixing example
Input Level, dBm Antenna LNA, dB Cable, dB
GPS L1 −130 +29.6 −10
Interference −30 dBm +17.6 −10
153
it will not saturate the front end but does cause a high
degree of in-band interference through reciprocal mixing.
In reality, LO spurs are commonly generated as pairs
of spectral lines in the LO generator and appear symmet-
rically about the LO signal. Even spurs that are not gen-
erated as part of the LO signal but are coupled into the
LO signal path by some other means are commonly
translated into symmetrical spurs when the LO signal is
amplitude limited inside the mixer. So the effect of spurs
at frequencies both above and below the LO signal need
to be considered properly. Further, reciprocal mixing is
not restricted to discrete spurious signals on the
LO. Excessive phase noise on the LO will also mix with
out of band spurious interference signals, potentially rais-
ing the noise floor at IF to degrade the signal-to-noise
ratio.
The range of frequencies where reciprocal mixing is
typically a concern occurs at offsets in the range of 10 to
50 MHz above and below the particular receive band. For
L1, this is from 1525 to 1565 MHz and 1585 to 1625 MHz.
For wide-bandwidth, precision receivers the susceptibility
range is further increased by the wide IF bandwidth used
within the receiver.
3.4 | Aliasing
Using results from other works,13,14 the effects of out-of-
band interference on receiver effective noise floor, (N0)eff,
including the effects of aliasing can be expressed as
f sð=2
X
∞ X
∞
ðN 0 Þeff = S~r ð f −kf s Þ Ss ð f − lf s Þdf ð10Þ
f = − f s =2
k = −∞ l = −∞
RF Stages, dB Mixer, dB Mixer Output Level, dBm
+25.1 +15 −70.3
+13.1 −45 −54.3
154
where fs is the receiver sample rate, S~r ð f Þ is the power
spectral density of the baseband filtered received signal,
and Ss(f ) is the power spectral density of the reference
GNSS pseudorandom noise (PRN) signal. Thus, a GNSS
receiver will have an increased sensitivity to interference
concentrated on frequencies that will be folded, through
the aliasing process, on top of the power spectrum of the
desired signal.
3.5 | In-band emissions
Although the center frequency (or frequencies) of an out-
of-band interference source is, by definition, not in a
GNSS frequency band, invariably, some of its transmitted
energy will fall into the GNSS bands. Energy that is in-
band to GNSS can result from (1) the natural roll-off of
transmissions that are at center frequencies immediately
adjacent to GNSS bands, (2) harmonics at integer multi-
ples of the interference source's center frequency due to
nonlinearities in the transmitter, (3) intermodulation
products at frequencies given by mf1 ± nf2 where f1 and f2
are two center frequencies of out-of-band sources, and (4)
spurious emissions from the interference source due to
various design imperfections. Harmonics and intermodu-
lation products are often very difficult to control, since
they may be generated externally to the transmitter.15,16
Interference from such mechanisms is best controlled
through domestic and international spectrum manage-
ment regulations.
4 | MITIGATION OF OUT-OF-
BAND INTERFERENCE EFFECTS
4.1 | Additional filtering
The key to maximizing out-of-band interference perfor-
mance is using sufficient filter rejection to minimize the
level of interference sources so they cannot cause desen-
sitization due to compression, IMD, or saturation issues
in the active stages. A wide variety of filtering technolo-
gies are commonly used for GNSS receiver applications,
which include the following:
4.1.1 | Dielectric resonators
Dielectric resonators are a very popular technology for
GNSS RF and, occasionally, IF filters. These filters use
small discs or cubes of low-loss high dielectric constant
material as coupled microwave resonators to provide a
low-cost, high-selectivity band-pass response.5 They are
HEGARTY ET AL.
also often referred to as ceramic filters, since ceramic is a
common dielectric material used in their fabrication.
Ceramic filters tend to have a very well-behaved fre-
quency response (eg, repeatable from unit to unit), very
good bandwidth and rejection performance, and are pre-
ferred for lower volume high-performance receivers.
4.1.2 | Surface acoustic wave (SAW)
SAW filters are available for both RF and IF frequencies
for GNSS receivers. SAW RF filters use resonators that
operate by converting the input electrical signal into
acoustic waves, using printed coupled resonant trans-
ducers, that propagate along the surface of a piezoelectric
substrate.17 They are inexpensive and typically much
smaller than dielectric resonators, which makes them an
extremely popular choice for applications where size is of
utmost importance, such as GPS receivers integrated into
cellphones and other mobile devices. Unfortunately,
there is little uniformity in the frequency response char-
acteristics between different SAW filters which makes
generalizing their performance difficult. SAW filters can
also exhibit great variation in center frequency with tem-
perature with a typical temperature coefficient of
30 ppm/ C. So, for instance, over the temperature range
of −30 C to +85 C, the center frequency of an L1 GNSS
SAW filter may vary by more than 5 MHz. Temperature-
compensated SAW filters have recently become commer-
cially available with greatly reduced temperature coeffi-
cients but with increased cost due to the complexity of
their fabrication.
At the lower IF frequencies, SAW filters use surface
waves as time delay elements to achieve a finite element
response (FIR) filter response similar to that resulting
from digital filters. This is in contrast to implementing
more traditional resonator style RF filters of higher fre-
quency SAW devices. In FIR filters, amplitude and phase
response are independent which allows simultaneous
near-brick-wall frequency response and relatively flat
group delay characteristic. In addition to the obvious
benefits of passing the signal with little amplitude and
phase distortion, the sharp transition region between the
pass and reject bands suppresses interference signals
which can be very close to the signal, which pass through
the less selective RF circuits. Unfortunately, however,
implementing the surface acoustic time delays necessary
inside the device results in a large insertion loss as shown
in the receiver model, as well as large absolute time
delays between the terminals of the actual physical
device. Further, small but finite reflections within the
device will cause a small amount of amplitude and phase
ripple to be measured on the device response.
HEGARTY ET AL.
4.1.3 | Bulk acoustic wave (BAW)
BAW filters18 operate in a similar fashion to SAW filters
in that they both operate through the use of resonators
in which electrical signals are converted to acoustic
waves. The difference between BAW and SAW filters is
that, in BAW filters, the acoustic waves propagate
through the substrate rather than along the surface
before they are converted back into electrical signals.
BAW filters have been gaining market share over SAW
filters for mass-market RF applications because they can
offer lower insertion losses and improved selectivity.
BAW filter technologies include free-standing bulk
acoustic resonators (FBAR) and solidly mounted resona-
tors (SMR). BAW filters tend to exhibit less sensitivity to
temperature (by about two-fold) than SAW filters, and
temperature-compensated products are becoming avail-
able with near-zero temperature sensitivity. A principle
BAW drawback with respect to SAW filters is that they
are more difficult to manufacture and thus slightly more
costly.
4.1.4 | Cavity filters
Cavity filters5 offer low-insertion loss and high out-of-
band attenuation, with their main drawback being that
they are extremely large and heavy. They operate using
similar principles as dielectric resonators, except that
they utilize an air-filled cavity within a conductor
rather than a dielectric block as the microwave
resonator.
4.1.5 | Lumped component filters
Filters built using inductors, capacitors, and resistors are
used at IF or baseband within many fielded GNSS
receivers. Some lumped component filters that only uti-
lize inductors and capacitors are referred to as LC filters,
which follows from the common engineering symbols for
inductance (L) and capacitance (C). Many GNSS chipsets
utilize external discrete inductors and capacitors as their
only means for IF filtering, see, eg, previous studies.19-21
LC filtering suffers from filter response and group delay
issues. It is difficult to obtain LC components with suffi-
cient tolerance to ensure good response repeatability dur-
ing manufacturing. They do have the advantage of better
amplitude and phase ripple, and somewhat better inser-
tion loss than SAW filters; however, they are not able to
attenuate interference sources immediately adjacent to
the pass-band as effectively as SAW IF filters. The
amount of attenuation provided by such filtering depends
155
on the design bandwidth of the LC filter and the order of
the filter. As one example, Anon20 describes a GPS L1
chipset that relies on a second-order, 15 MHz 3-dB band-
width Butterworth LC filter centered at an IF frequency
of 183 MHz. With this frequency plan, this filter provides
~10 dB of attenuation at 1550 MHz and ~40 dB at 1530
MHz. Active resistor-capacitor (RC) filters are also quite
common in GNSS chipsets. These offer the benefit that
they can be implemented internally to the chip, see, eg,
Gramegna et al.22
4.2 | Filter performance considerations
There is no single best filter technology for every
GNSS application. Filters are generally selected based
upon a careful consideration of numerous trade-offs
between selectivity, insertion loss, differential group
delay, size, weight, and cost. Definitions of these and
other important filter characteristics are provided in
Appendix B.
Figure 14 shows typical attenuation characteristics,
and Table 2 presents a comparison of the typical charac-
teristics of the various RF filter types identified above to
illustrate some of these trade-offs. A more expansive
treatment may be found in NPEF.23 As a caveat on inter-
preting typical performance characteristics, it is impor-
tant to note that components can only be relied upon to
meet specifications not “typical” values to allow for
manufacturing and temperature variations. The rele-
vance of specifications over typical performance is partic-
ularly true for filters with sharp cutoff transitions for
which small variations can have very significant effects.
F I G U R E 1 4 Representative attenuation characteristics of
various GNSS RF filter types [Color figure can be viewed
at wileyonlinelibrary.com and www.ion.org]
156
TABLE 2 Comparison of various GNSS RF filter technologies
3-dB Band-width, Attenuation (dB) at
Technology MHz L1 ± 0/20/40 MHz
Dielectric 24 2.2/4/20
SAW 30 1.4/4/20
BAW 30 2.5/8/50
Cavity (narrow) 4 1.9/50/65
Cavity (wide) 30 0.7/8/50
a
Temperature-compensated products are available with much lower temperature coefficients but higher cost.
The specifications allow for margin to account for such
effects.
4.3 | Increasing linear region for active
components
Interference-induced intermodulation distortion and
compression effects are minimized by using amplifiers
and mixers with sufficiently high compression points.
Unfortunately, the highest compression points are
accompanied by the highest operating current levels.
Therefore, it is important to understand the interference
environment as well as possible and model the front end
on that basis.
It is possible through various design techniques to
achieve greater linearity in a GNSS receiver's active com-
ponents, see, eg, Morgan.24 Use of such techniques, how-
ever, comes at the expense of increased receiver noise
figure and higher power consumption. In the end, careful
system modeling and choice of appropriate amplifiers is
the best strategy.
4.4 | Multi-frequency, multi-
constellation considerations
Many GNSS receivers process desired signals from more
than one GNSS constellation on two or more center fre-
quencies. This functionality can be enabled by simply
duplicating the full set of RF front-end components
shown in Figure 1 for each center frequency, but this is
rarely done. For instance, almost all multi-frequency
GNSS receivers use just a single antenna (unless multiple
antennas are needed for other reasons, eg, attitude deter-
mination). A broadband antenna or one that is resonant
at multiple frequencies (eg, a stacked patch) may be used.
Most multi-frequency receivers also share filters between
desired passbands. A diplexer is a filter that passes two
bands of frequencies, and a triplexer is used for three fre-
quencies. LNAs may be shared between bands and
HEGARTY ET AL.
Frequency Stability, Volume, Unit Cost,
ppm/ C cm3 $
2-10 2 <5
30-60a 0.0006 <1
15-30a 0.0006 <1
1-2 450 500-1000
1-2 600 500-1000
aliasing may be intentionally exploited to share an A/D
converter between two or more bands. Overall, for a
multi-frequency GNSS receiver all of the same out-of-
band interference coupling mechanisms must be consid-
ered as for a single-frequency receiver but mitigating per-
formance degradations becomes more complicated. The
designer must consider the impact of interference on the
processing paths for each center frequency.
4.5 | Other design considerations
Good design practices help to optimize interference rejec-
tion. Power supply isolation is important to decouple the
various RF stages from each other. While this is impor-
tant for the stability of the active stages, it also prevents
interference signals which appear at one amplifier from
possibly bypassing the filters via the power supply lines
to another amplifier farther down the line. The perfor-
mance of filters which have 60 or 70 dB of ultimate rejec-
tion can easily by compromised by signals passing
around them via the power supply lines.
There is a trend to open up the input bandwidth of
A/D devices to very high frequencies. This makes the
inputs susceptible to broadband noise and otherwise
ignored interference sources. It is prudent to constrain
the input bandwidth of the A/D to the chosen operating
bandwidth. While a band-pass filter would work immedi-
ately prior to the A/D, it is often sufficient to simply cas-
cade a two-or three-element low-pass filter with a similar
order high pass filter to ensure that these unwanted sig-
nals are not aliased to frequencies which may degrade
the input signal.
4.6 | Applicability to fielded equipment
It should be noted that there is extremely limited applica-
bility of the mitigation approaches identified in this paper
to fielded equipment. There may be some instances
where additional filtering can be added to in-use systems,
HEGARTY ET AL.
primarily for GNSS equipment that utilizes external
active antennas. In such cases, it is possible that an exis-
ting antenna can be exchanged for a new one that
employs additional filtering, or an in-line filter added
between the external antenna and the receiver. Such
modifications must be done only with extreme caution
since they could detrimentally impact system perfor-
mance in numerous ways.
For a large quantity of fielded receivers, modification
is not cost-effective. For instance, the receivers and
antennas may be in an integrated package, in which case
out-of-band interference issues can only realistically be
resolved through replacement.
5 | S UM MA R Y
This paper has described the main mechanisms by which
out-of-band interference can disrupt GNSS receiver func-
tioning. These mechanisms include saturation and desen-
sitization of front-end low noise amplifiers, mixers and
other circuitry; reciprocal mixing effects that arise from
the fact that receivers cannot generate a perfect tone to
down-convert the desired signals; intermodulation prod-
ucts; aliasing of out-of-band emissions that remain after
filtering into the receiver's passband; and the reception of
in-band (to GNSS) emissions that are always present due
to imperfections in the signal generation and filtering of
the interfering system.
For most of these mechanisms, the best mitigation
approach is through filtering properly distributed
throughout the receiver front-end. Although there are a
wide variety of filtering technologies available for use in
GNSS receivers, not all are suitable for any given applica-
tion. The trade-offs involved in selecting appropriate fil-
ters have been detailed.
ORCID
Christopher J. Hegarty https://orcid.org/0000-0001-
5728-6925
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A P P EN D I X A : | DESCRIPTION OF
HARDWARE SETUP FOR INTERMODULATION
EXAMPLE
Conducted emission tests of aviation receivers required
the use of a filter/LNA that met RTCA DO-301 require-
ments. These tests introduce the combined GNSS signal
and RFI source within the antenna assembly after the
antenna element and just before the filter/LNA using
either a power combiner or coupler. GNSS filter/LNAs
built for aviation applications are normally integrated into
an antenna assembly and not available as individual com-
ponents. Furthermore, DO-301 requirements specify the
overall frequency response, gain and P1dB for compo-
nents in front of aviation receivers but do not dictate the
exact implementation and therefore the distribution of fil-
tering and gain is a choice that manufacturers make. A
representative filter/LNA was constructed by using a
combination of amplifiers and spectrally shaping the
input interference signal that in effect achieved the
requirements of DO-301 at the output of these compo-
nents. Figure A1 displays the Mini-Circuits components
used to achieve performance that met DO-301 require-
ments. Table A1 displays the pertinent characteristics of
this combination of amplifiers, including the total gain,
FIGURE A1 LNA representative of aviation LNA
HEGARTY ET AL.
sion of the Institute of Navigation (ION GNSS 2005). Long
Beach, California, September 2005:2401-2407.
How to cite this article: Hegarty CJ, Bobyn D,
Grabowski J, Van Dierendonck AJ. An overview of
the effects of out-of-band interference on GNSS
receivers. NAVIGATION. 2020;67:143–161. https://
doi.org/10.1002/navi.345
TABLE A1 Aviation LNA characteristics
Gain +42.3 dB
P1 dB at input −23.5 dBm
IP3 at input −12.8 dBm
IP3 level at output +29.6 dBm
Noise figure +3.5 dB
1-dB compression point (P1 dB), third-order intercept
point (IP3), and noise figure. Although the gain of this
amplifier is much higher than required, the actual gain
that was provided to individual aviation receivers was
much lower due to cabling and a power splitter that pro-
vided test signals to multiple aviation receivers simulta-
neously. The net gain for any individual aviation receiver
was +26 dB.
Interference signal generation was accomplished
using an Arbitrary Waveform Generator (AWG) that had
two independent channels and whose intended signals
were created as complex representations of the desired
signals centered on 0 Hertz. The two channels of the
AWG were connected to a Vector Signal Generator (VSG)
that translated these signals to RF. Two types of candidate
interference signals were considered, each of which was
below 1560 MHz. Both types consisted of broadband noise
separated by a stop band. One interference signal, referred
to as phase 1, consisted of two 5-MHz broad band noise
signals occupying 1526.3 to 1531.3 MHz and 1550.2 to
1555.2 MHz. The other interference signal, referred to as
phase 2, consisted of two 10-MHz broad band noise sig-
nals occupying 1526 to 1536 MHz and 1545.2 to 1555.2
MHz. Both of these intended interference signals are
shown in Figure A2 as they would appear at the antenna
input.
The signals shown in Figure A2 would be filtered and
amplified by components within an aviation antenna
assembly and would therefore not be the same spectrally
at the output of a DO-301 compliant filter/LNA.
Figure A3 displays DO-301 filtering requirements and
HEGARTY ET AL.
F I G U R E A 2 Broadband interference signals [Color figure
can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com and www.ion.org]
therefore the output from a DO-301 compliant
filter/LNA must reduce spectral power to within these
limits.
The desired frequency response at the output of the
aviation LNA was achieved by spectrally shaping the
broad band noise so that it included the filtering that
DO-301 requires. Spectra of signals at the input of the
representative aviation LNA are shown in Figure 11 and
follow the frequency slope that DO-301 requires.
A P P EN D I X B : | GNSS RF FILTER
PERFORMANCE CHARACTERISTIC
DEFINITIONS
In this appendix, important performance characteristics
for GNSS filters are presented.
F I G U R E A 3 DO-301 antenna frequency
response [Color figure can be viewed
at wileyonlinelibrary.com and www.ion.org]
159
FILTER TYPES
Band-pass and low-pass filters are most commonly used
for GNSS applications. As illustrated in Figure B1, ideal
band-pass and low-pass filters allow only a range of fre-
quencies to pass through and completely suppress signals
outside of this frequency range. For band-pass filters, the
frequency range spans between two positive frequency
values. Band-pass filters are used within GNSS receivers
or active antennas to pass the desired RF GNSS signals
before down-conversion (eg, at L1 ± 15 MHz for a
receiver wishing to process all of the GPS L1 signals) and
may also be used at IF after down-conversion. Low-pass
filters are often found after down-conversion within
receivers that utilize a low or no IF, or at times even with
a high IF to suppress harmonics generated within the
mixers used for down-conversion.
SELECTIVITY
Selectivity is the amount of attenuation that is provided
by the filter towards undesired signals (ie, those that
fall outside of the filter passband). Although as illus-
trated in Figure B1 ideal filters completely suppress sig-
nals outside of the passband, as will be seen in typical
characteristics to be presented throughout this section,
realizable filters can only provide a finite amount of
attenuation. Achievable attenuation in realizable filters
typically is generally small close to the passband and
increases as frequency separation from the passband
grows.
The passband is selected based upon the signals that
are intended to be processed. For example, Figure B2
160
FIGURE B1 Ideal band-pass and low-pass filters [Color
figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com and www.ion.org]
F I G U R E B 2 Legacy and modernized GPS L1 signals [Color
figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com and www.ion.org]
depicts the GPS L1 signals. Although 90% of the C/A-
code power is contained within L1 ± 1 MHz, importantly,
the ability of a GNSS receiver to precisely range upon the
C/A-code or any other GNSS signal is enhanced tremen-
dously in the presence of noise and multipath by addi-
tionally processing the sidelobes (see, eg, Van
Dierendonck et al25). Modern high-precision receivers
generally utilize the full bandwidth of the signals trans-
mitted by the GNSS satellites (40 MHz or more for some
of the operational satellites) and often use a passband
HEGARTY ET AL.
that is even broader than this for reasons related to group
delay (see discussion below) and/or the desire to track
signals that are or will be broadcast by multiple constella-
tions (eg, GPS, GLONASS, Galileo, BeiDou, satellite-
based augmentation systems [SBAS], QZSS). Many high-
precision GNSS receivers utilize a common front-end to
additionally process differential corrections that are
transmitted by communication satellites in the 1525 to
1559 MHz band.
Selectivity is generally described using the magnitude
of the transfer function,|H(f)|, of the filter, which is the
ratio of the filter output spectrum to the spectrum of its
input. Decibel (dB) units are typically used, with
attenuation in dB equal to 20log10|H(f )|. For RF
filters, vendors often provide scattering matrix parame-
ters (S-parameters) with the S21 parameter providing the
transfer function.
INSERTION LOSS
Realizable analog filters will always provide some unde-
sired attenuation of signals in the passband, which is
referred to as insertion loss. Minimizing insertion loss is
important, especially for any filter prior to the first signif-
icant gain stage within a GNSS receiver's front-end since
this filter characteristic impacts the receiver's noise floor.
In a benign environment, GNSS receivers see a noise
floor that is due to
1. Undesired energy received from the antenna
2. Undesired energy from sources internal to the
receiver/antenna, eg, due to thermal agitation of elec-
trons within the antenna/receiver components.
Additional filtering will always increase the noise
floor and the extent to which this occurs can be quanti-
fied using the expressions [(3)]:
N 0 = kT sys , ðB1Þ
  
T sys = T s + T 0 L1 −1 + L1 NF 1 −1 + G1 − 1 ½L2 −1 + … ,
ðB2Þ
where N0 is the noise density (in units of W/Hz)
referenced to the output port of the passive antenna, k =
1.38E-23 J/K is Boltzmann's constant, and Tsys is the sys-
tem temperature (in units of K). Ts is the source or
antenna temperature (75 to 100 K for a typical GNSS
antenna that provides a broad gain pattern, ie, the upper
hemisphere), T0 is 290 K, and the entire second term in
the right-hand-side of Equation (B2) is the receiver
HEGARTY ET AL.
temperature. Of importance to the present discussion, the
receiver temperature is influenced greatly by the first loss
(with loss, in linear units, L1) suffered between the out-
put port of the passive antenna and the first gain stage
(with gain, in linear units, G1) in the receiver, as well as
the noise figure, NF1, of the first amplifier. Losses and
noise figures of components further downstream in the
receiver front-end are of lesser importance if the gain, G1,
is sufficiently high. Equation (B2) is recursive, in that its
form repeats for additional losses, gains, and noise
figures.
For the reasons described above, it is desirable for any
filtering prior to the first low noise amplifier (LNA)
within a GNSS active antenna or receiver front-end to
have extremely low insertion loss. Insertion loss adds to
the noise. Typical target design values can range from
under 2.2 dB for aviation receivers with a clear view of
the sky to less than 0.5 dB for some other applications.
Filters with higher insertion losses can often be tolerated
later within the RF/IF chain provided that the preceding
net gain far outweighs the preceding net loss. So for
instance, filters with insertion losses of up to 15 to 20 dB
may be found at IF in numerous fielded receivers with
little detrimental impact on receiver noise floor.
GROUP DELAY
The phase response of a filter is also of great importance
for many applications. Any phase response within the
passband that is not linear with frequency will distort the
desired signals. The derivative of the phase response with
161
respect to frequency is referred to as the group delay
response because this function of frequency describes
how much time delay is incurred upon each frequency
component of the desired signal.
For navigation and positioning applications, the abso-
lute value of the group delay is not consequential since it
does not affect position accuracy. For such applications,
the group delay differential, which describes how much
the group delay varies over the passband, is the critical
characteristic. It is desirable to keep the group delay dif-
ferential as small as possible over the passband to enable
better positioning performance. This design goal is espe-
cially important for receivers that make measurements
from more than one satellite navigation system within a
band, see, eg, Hegarty et al.26 Receivers used for time
transfer, ionospheric mapping, and other science applica-
tions also require the group and phase delays to be stable
over variations in temperature.
Group delay differential generally grows with increas-
ing filter selectivity, and the frequencies where maximum
group delay differential is typically seen are in the transi-
tion region between the passband and stopband. For
these reasons, many fielded high-precision receivers use
passbands that extend beyond the 1559 to 1610 MHz
radionavigation satellite services (RNSS) band. It is also
possible for some filter technologies to use specialized
designs to provide delay compensation to minimize group
delay differential. The use of narrow filters with sharp
cutoffs, as well as some implementations of delay com-
pensation, increases the variation of group delay and
phase versus temperature.