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NAVSTAR
The Global Positioning System was designed and built, and is operated and maintained by the U.S.
Department of Defence (c.f., e.g., Parkinson and Spilker 1996). The first GPS satellite was launched in 1978,
and the system was fully operational in the mid-1990s.
The GPS constellation consists of 24 satellites in six orbital planes with four satellites in each plane. The
ascending nodes of the orbital planes are equally spaced by 60 degrees. The orbital planes are inclined 55
degrees. Each GPS satellite is in a nearly circular orbit with a semi-major axis of 26 578 km and a period of
about twelve hours.
The GPS satellites are monitored by five base stations. The main base station is in Colorado Springs,
Colorado and the other four are located on Ascension Island (Atlantic Ocean), Diego Garcia (Indian
Ocean), Kwajalein and Hawaii (both Pacific Ocean).
All stations are equipped with precise cesium clocks and receivers to determine the broadcast
ephemerides and to model the satellite clocks. Transmitted to the satellites are ephemerides and clock
adjustments. The satellites in turn use these updates in the signals that they send to GPS receivers.
Each GPS satellite transmits data on three frequencies: L1 (1575.42 MHz), L2 (1227.60 MHz) and L5
(1176.45 MHz). The L1, L2 and L5 carrier frequencies are generated by multiplying the fundamental
frequency by 154, 120 and 115, respectively.
GPS uses the World Geodetic System WGS-84, developed by the US Department of Defense (DoD),
which is a unified terrestrial reference system for position and vector referencing. Indeed, the GPS
broadcast ephemeris are linked to the position of the satellite antenna phase centre in the WGS-84
reference frame. Thus, the user receiver coordinates will be expressed in the same ECEF frame.
Atomic Time is a time system kept by atomic clocks such as International Atomic Time (TAI). It is a
uniformly-scaled time used in the ECEF coordinate system. Because of the slowing down of the Earths
rotation with respect to the Sun, Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) is introduced to keep the
synchronisation of TAI to the solar day (by inserting the leap seconds). GPS Time (GPST) is also an
atomic time.
The relationships between different time systems are given as follows:
TAI= UTC+n sec
TAI= GPST+ 19.0 sec where n is the number of the leap seconds
GLONASS
GLONASS is a Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) managed by the Russian Space Forces and the
system is operated by the Coordination Scientific Information Center (KNITs) of the Ministry of Defense
of the Russian Federation. The first GLONASS satellite was launched into orbit in 1982.
The system consists of 21 satellites in three orbital planes, with three on-orbit spares.The ascending nodes
of three orbital planes are separated 120 degrees, and the satellites within the same orbit plane are equally
spaced by 45 degrees. Each satellite operates in nearly circular orbits with a semi-major axis of 25 510 km.
Each orbital plane has an inclination angle of 64.8 degrees, and each satellite completes an orbit in
approximately 11 hours 16 minutes.
The ground control stations of the GLONASS are maintained only in the territory of the former Soviet
Union due to the historical reasons. This lack of global coverage is not optimal for the monitoring of a
global navigation satellite system.
The satellites transmit coded signals in two frequencies located on two frequency bands, 1 6021 615.5
MHz and 1 2461 256.5 MHz, with a frequency interval of 0.5625 MHz and 0.4375 MHz, respectively.
f
1
=(1.602+9k 16)GHz , f
2
=(1.246+7k 16)GHz where k=0,1,2,.23 is the satellite number
C/A-code=0.511 MHz , p-code= 5.11
MHz GLONASS satellites are distinguished by slightly different carrier
frequencies instead of by different PRN codes.
The GLONASS broadcast ephemeris are given in the Parametry Zemli 1990 (Parameters of the Earth 1990)
(PZ-90) reference frame. As the WGS-84, this is an ECEF frame with a set of fundamental parameters
GLONASS time (GLOT) is defined by Moscow time UTC
SU
, which equals UTC plus three hours
(corresponding to the offset of Moscow time to Greenwich time), theoretically. GLOT is permanently
monitored and adjusted by the GLONASS Central Synchronizer .UTC and GLOT then has a simple
relation UTC=GLOT+ tc3h,
Where tc is the system time correction with respect to UTC
SU
,
which is broadcasted by the GLONASS ephemerides and is less than one microsecond. Therefore there is
approximately GPST=GLOT+m3h, where m is
called a number of leap seconds" between GPS and GLONASS (UTC) time
and is given in the GLONASS ephemerides.
Galileo
Galileo is a Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) initiated by the European Union (EU) and the
European Space Agency (ESA) for providing a highly accurate, guaranteed global positioning service
under civilian control
The Galileo constellation consists of 30 Medium Earth Orbit (MEO) satellites in three orbital planes with
nine equally spaced operational satellites in each plane plus one inactive spare satellite. The ascending
nodes of the orbital planes are equally spaced by 120 degrees. The orbital planes are inclined 56 degrees.
Each Galileo satellite is in a nearly circular orbit with semi-major axis of 29 600 km and a period of about
14 hours.
Galileo satallites are monitored by two Ground Control Centers (GCC) in European countries. The data
provided by a global network of 30-40 Galileo Sensor Stations (GSS) will be sent to the Galileo Control
Centers to compute the integrity information and to synchronize the time signal of all satellites.
Galileo provides ten navigation signals in the frequency ranges 1 1641 215 MHz (E5a and E5b), 1 2151 300
MHz (E6) and 1 5591 592 MHz (E2-L1-E1) (cf. Hein et al. 2004). The interoperability and compatibility
of Galileo and GPS is realized by having two common centre frequencies in E5a/L5 and L1
Galileo Terrestrial Reference Frame (GTRF) in which the three-dimensional differences of the position
compared to the most recent ITRF should not exceed 3 cm (2-sigma).
Galileo system time (GST) will be maintained by a number of UTC laboratory clocks. GST and GPST are
time systems of various UTC laboratories. After the offset of GST and GPST is made available to the user,
the interoperability will be ensured.