Huazhong University of Science and Technology

Assessment Task
Research Report
The Impact of Low Earth Orbit (LEO) Satellite

Development on navigation

Course Name: DQP Course

Assessment Due Date: 27/6/2022

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 Contents
Abstract ................................................................................... 3

Introduction ............................................................................. 4

Methods .................................. Error! Bookmark not defined.

Literature review outcome ....... Error! Bookmark not defined.

Results ..................................................................................................................................... 5

Discussion ............................................................................... 6

Conclusion .............................................................................. 6

Recommendation .................................................................... 6

References .............................................................................. 7

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Abstract
The aim of this report was to investigate the impact of Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite
development on navigation. Several methods such as searching journal databases were used to
collect reliable information and data. Furthermore, simulation experiments on four positioning
modes were carried out by MATLAB. Overall, LEO satellite can be used for independent
navigation or assist other systems such as Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) and
Inertial Navigation (INS) for positioning. The report concludes that the integrated navigation
system composed of LEO and other systems can provide accurate positioning and strong system
robustness. It is recommended that researchers can choose to study LEO based combined
positioning algorithm as their research direction.

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Introduction
With the completion of Chinese BeiDou Navigation Satellite System (BDS), the world has
witnessed four GNSS systems that are able to provide Positioning, Navigation, and Timing (PNT)
services. Along with the gradual development of LEO constellation, in order to overcome the
vulnerability and limitations of GNSS, scholars proposed to use LEO satellites to assist GNSS in
providing PNT services. According to Ge (2022), LEO Enhanced Global Navigation Satellite
System (LeGNSS) is being vigorously advocated.

This report examines the different roles that LEO plays in PNT services, independently or
synergistically. This report also provides a simple simulation result to indicate how LEO affects
LeGNSS.

Methodology
Several methods were adopted to collect reliable information. First, four Journal databases were
searched: IEEE Xplore, Google scholar, SpringerLink and ResearchGate. The reference
sections of selected articles were also searched to find additional articles. The search process
resulted in 9 peer-reviewed articles published between 2015 and 2022. This report is not a
comprehensive review of the available literature, but provides a broad overview of the topic.

The simulation is realized by MATLAB. The data sources of simulation are TLE files published
by NORAD.

Literature review outcome

The signal anti-jamming capability of LEO satellites is better than that of GNSS because of its
strong signal power, which demonstrates their potential in positioning services. Leng (2015) used
Iridium ring alert signal for positioning and claimed that the Iridium position service accuracy was
20-50m. Limited by the orbital design and number of LEO constellations, only one LEO satellite
can be observed in many regions. Chen (2016) showed that using a single LEO satellite for
positioning could achieve 100m accuracy but took a long time to locate. When considering the
dynamics of locating the target, the positioning performance in Vasavada (2017) became
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unsatisfactory that the convergence time took at least 6 minutes and the accuracy was 100-
1000m. Khalife (2021) exhibited the resulting positioning performance of tracking Starlink signals,
and the position error was 33.5m in three dimensions.

LEO can enhance GNSS in three ways. First, LEO satellite signals can be used as additional
navigation information sources to assist GNSS positioning, especially when the GNSS signal is
obstructed. Hsu (2014) showed that when three GNSS satellites failed to locate, receiving one
more LEO satellite signal could achieve the same positioning accuracy as GNSS. Second, LEO
signals can be used to strapdown GNSS/INS integrated navigation to improve the navigation of
aircraft or vehicles. Morales (2019) claimed that Doppler delay extracted from LEO signal
reduced positioning error of long-flying UAV. Third, LEO signal assists precise point positioning
(PPP). Xie (2018) argued that the convergence time of PPP could be shortened from 30min to
1.3min attributed from LEO.

Results
The simulation is implemented by MATLAB, which simulates the locating scenarios of three
locating modes at 0° longitude and different latitudes. In order to simulate the scene where the
BDS satellites are obscured, we also simulate the combined positioning mode with only two BDS
satellites being observed. The results are listed below in Table 1. It can be clearly seen from the
results that the positioning performance of Iridium/BDS based combined positioning modes is
significantly better than the performance of their individual positioning modes.

Table 1
Positioning pattern Available Latitude (°) Positioning error(m) Convergence time(s)
BDS 0-90 4.21 3-5
Iridium 30-60 22.1-10.9 180
BDS+Iridium 0-90 0.9 2-4
BDS(2)+Iridium 10-90 104-3.4 5-10

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Discussion
It can be seen from the results in Table 1 that both BDS and integrated model are valid at full
latitude, which means they are worldwide effective, while Iridium is only valid from 30° to 60°
latitude. Combined positioning mode reduces positioning error by 80% to 95%, compared to two
independent positioning modes. Furthermore, the combined positioning mode significantly
reduces the positioning time.

When only two BDS satellites are observed, BDS loses efficacy, and the combined positioning
mode will not work in low latitudes(0°-10°). The reason of it is that Iridium has low visibility near
the equator and high visibility in the polar region due to its constellation design. Furthermore, the
positioning error decreases from 100m to 3m as latitude increases for the same reason.

These findings are consistent with other studies. According to Zhao (2020), combined positioning
with more constellations results in better positioning performance and robustness.

Conclusion
LEO-based integrated navigation system has strong advantages over stand-alone systems. On
the one hand, LEO-based integrated navigation system can improve positioning accuracy and
reduce positioning time. On the other hand, LEO-based integrated navigation system can ensure
worldwide availability and usability in extremely harsh environments. It has good research
prospects and potential to improve our lives.

Recommendation
It is recommended that researchers can choose to study LEO-based combined positioning
algorithm as their research direction. Directions include:
• Positioning calculation method;
• Combined positioning receiver design;
• Combination of multiple navigation information sources.

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Reference lists
Chen, X., Wang, M., & Zhang, L. (2016, May). Analysis on the performance bound of Doppler
positioning using one LEO satellite. In 2016 IEEE 83rd Vehicular Technology Conference
(VTC Spring) (pp. 1-5). IEEE.
Ge, H., Li, B., Jia, S., Nie, L., Wu, T., Yang, Z., ... & Ge, M. (2022). LEO enhanced global
navigation satellite system (LeGNSS): progress, opportunities, and challenges. Geo-spatial
Information Science, 25(1), 1-13.
Hsu, W. H., & Jan, S. S. (2014, May). Assessment of using Doppler shift of LEO satellites to aid
GPS positioning. In 2014 IEEE/ION Position, Location and Navigation Symposium-PLANS
2014 (pp. 1155-1161). IEEE.
Khalife, J., Neinavaie, M., & Kassas, Z. M. (2021). The first carrier phase tracking and positioning
results with Starlink LEO satellite signals. IEEE Transactions on Aerospace and Electronic
Systems, 58(2), 1487-1491.
Leng, M., Lei, L., Razul, S. G., & See, C. M. S. (2015, December). Joint synchronization and
localization using Iridium ring alert signal. In 2015 10th International Conference on
Information, Communications and Signal Processing (ICICS) (pp. 1-5). IEEE.
Morales, J., Khalife, J., & Kassas, Z. M. (2019, April). Simultaneous tracking of Orbcomm LEO
satellites and inertial navigation system aiding using Doppler measurements. In 2019 IEEE
89th Vehicular Technology Conference (VTC2019-Spring) (pp. 1-6). IEEE.
Vasavada, Y., Arur, D., Ravishankar, C., & Barnett, C. (2017, October). User location
determination using delay and Doppler measurements in LEO satellite systems.
In MILCOM 2017-2017 IEEE Military Communications Conference (MILCOM) (pp. 325-
330). IEEE.
Xie, X., Geng, T., Zhao, Q., Liu, X., Zhang, Q., & Liu, J. (2018). Design and validation of broadcast
ephemeris for low Earth orbit satellites. GPS solutions, 22(2), 1-11.
Zhao, Q., Pan, S., Gao, C., Gao, W., & Xia, Y. (2020). BDS/GPS/LEO triple-frequency
uncombined precise point positioning and its performance in harsh
environments. Measurement, 151, 107216.