Antenna influence on Global Navigation Satellite System pseudorange performance for future aeronautics multifrequency standardization

Abstract

Current standardization activities in the navigation field in the aeronautical community are paving the way to using multi-frequency multi-constellation GNSS as primary means of aircraft navigation in the next decades. The increase in the number of satellites from different constellations as well as the increasing use of multiple frequency GNSS receivers promise improvements in the achievable accuracy in GNSS positioning. In order to obtain improved performance, the effects of the receiver antennas shall be investigated, due to the stronger impact that possible imperfections might have in the overall error budget for multifrequency combinations. This paper shows an analysis of antenna induced errors in pseudorange code measurements for different antenna feeding types tackling the problem both from an electromagnetic and a GNSS point of view. Electromagnetic simulations are used to understand the physics of the antenna induced error. Furthermore, the electromagnetic measurements and GNSS processing are then used to estimate the purely antenna induced GNSS pseudorange error and to compare them with results from GNSS field measurements.