Efficient solution and performance analysis of 3-D positionestimation by trilateration

A new exact, explicit, and computationally efficient solution for three-dimensional (3-D) position estimation based on range measurements from three stations is proposed. The simple polynomial-type form of the new algorithm facilitates the performance analysis. Formulae are provided for both the variance and the bias of the position estimates. The systematic error is a joint effect of both the measurement noise and the system nonlinearity and its magnitude cannot be ignored if highly accurate localization is required. Performance evaluation results are presented for various conditions     

Computation of aircraft geometric height under radar surveillance

A radar system for geometric height estimation of civil aircraft is described. The system consists of one standard or mode S secondary surveillance radar (SSR) and one omnidirectional antenna sited away from SSR under an airplane. The geometric height is derived by trilateration. Systematic errors are compensated for by deriving the profile of the effect on height measurements of the bias in range measurements. A curve-fitting technique is then used, which estimates both the geometric height and any non-zero systematic errors     

Inherent bias assessment in height computation employing mixed-typeradar data

The objective here is the analysis of a systematic error inherently existing in aircraft geometric height monitoring under radar surveillance. This error is caused by the nonlinear processing of noisy measurements. The geometric height system under investigation uses mixed-type radar data, since the height is computed by referring range raw measurements to horizontal trajectory smoothed data