Characterizing the Carrier Phase Distortions for Different Interference Mitigation Approaches using an Antenna Array

Abstract

The use of GNSS positioning in highly automated systems, like packet delivering using drones or self-driving cars, demands a reliable and accurate position estimation. At the same time the risk for interference, intentional or unintentional, increases. A promising countermeasure is to suppress the interference with spatial filters using an antenna array. However, these filters can induces a phase error to the carrier phase measurements, which are obligatory for high precision approaches like Precise Point Positioning (PPP). In this work the induced carrier phase error is studied for some common techniques like the minimum variance distortionless response (MVDR) or the Eigenbeamformer. The phase errors are studied for an ideal antenna array as well as for a measured antenna pattern. The MVDR does not introduce any errors in theory, but it needs some information about the array configuration and the incoming signals. Therefore a sensitivity analyses of the MVDR is conducted.