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A multinational European team, fronted by France’s Centre National d'Etudes Spatiales (CNES), is among the winners at this year’s European Inventor Awards. Their project, which ensures that satellite signals do not interfere with each other, allows users and developers alike to benefit from the next-generation positioning technology that Galileo offers.

The project Radio signals for better satellite navigation was declared the winner in the Research category at the European Patent Office’s European Inventor Awards, Europe’s most prestigious prize for innovation. The results of the awards were announced at a 15 June ceremony held in Venice, Italy. The project created modulation and spread-spectrum signal technologies that strengthen some of Galileo's core components: enhanced accuracy and ensured interoperability with GLONASS and GPS (including possible upgrades), along with saving on satellite power.

Watch this: Radio signals for better satellite navigation

The team was led by French engineer Laurent Lestarquit and his Spanish colleague José Ángel Ávila Rodríguez and included France’s Jean-Luc Issler, German Günter Hein and Belgian Lionel Ries. Quoted on the EPO website, Lestarquit said he was proud of the teamwork and of what the team had achieved. Co-inventor José Ángel Ávila Rodríguez also noted that the project was something that Europeans could feel proud of. "When the nations of Europe work together, the whole world benefits," he said.

How it works

Lestarquit developed a patented modulation technique called Alternative Binary Offset Carrier modulation (AltBOC), which effectively packs four signals into one large one: two highly accurate signals from Galileo's Open Service and two signals from its Safety-of-Life service.

The result is that AltBOC not only offers extremely high accuracy for specialised receivers, it also helps save satellite power.

In addition, the team developed an innovative spread-spectrum technique that creates a new single waveform via what is called Composite Binary Offset Carrier (CBOC) modulation. Not only will this signal allow high-end receivers to accurately calculate positions, it is also compatible with older, lower-end devices and other GNSS signals. The CBOC patent includes a novel concept allowing for the combination of open CBOC and secured Public Regulated Service (PRS) signals in a single frequency. PRS signals are designed to be used by civil authorities, such as police, coastguards and customs agencies. PRS is encrypted and includes anti-jamming mechanisms.

European Inventor Award

Now in its 12th year, the European Inventor Award is presented annually by the European Patent Office (EPO) to recognise outstanding inventors from Europe and around the world who have made exceptional contributions to social development, technological progress and economic growth.

Also watch: European Inventor Award 2017 - News

The finalists and winners in five categories (Industry, Research, Non-EPO countries, Small and medium-sized enterprises and Popular Prize) are selected by an independent jury consisting of international authorities in the fields of business, science, academia and research, who examine the proposals in terms of their contribution towards technical progress, social development, and wealth and job creation in Europe.

Media note: This feature can be republished without charge provided the European GNSS Agency (GSA) is acknowledged as the source at the top or the bottom of the story. You must request permission before you use any of the photographs on the site. If you republish, we would be grateful if you could link back to the GSA website (http://www.gsa.europa.eu).

The GSA-funded mapKITE project has created an advanced surveying tool by combining terrestrial mobile mapping systems with Unmanned Aerial System mapping capabilities.

Geo-information is fundamental in any modern society, with many infrastructures and services depending on it. However, it is also expensive to create and update. As a result, European, national and local government agencies must balance a growing demand for high-resolution, up-to-date geo-information against decreasing budgets.

The Horizon 2020 mapKITE project responds to this market need by combining terrestrial mobile mapping systems (TMMS) with Unmanned Aerial System (UAS) mapping capabilities. The resulting tool is a tandem terrestrial vehicle (TV) and unmanned aircraft (UA) equipped with remote sensing instruments that cooperate in collecting geo-data. The system integrates E-GNSS capabilities into drones and proposes a novel geo-data post-processing concept to provide surveyors and mappers with an end-to-end solution for 3-D high-resolution corridor mapping.

Also read: Network providers enthusiastic about Galileo at CLGE General Assembly

The GSA-funded project has now concluded after two years of development and validation, executed by a consortium of 10 companies from six different countries and coordinated by GeoNumerics. Recently, the project gathered over 40 industry specialists from world-leading mobile mapping integrators, European mapping service companies and cartographic and infrastructure management agencies to officially introduce – and demonstrate – the mapKITE system.

Introducing mapKITE

“While terrestrial mobile mapping systems are becoming a standard surveying tool, their use is restricted due to their limited and insufficient view from the ground,” said Project Coordinator Pere Molina during the event. “On the technology side, mapping of small areas via small unmanned aircraft has become a reality, with many of the big geomatic technology companies already including UAS systems in their product portfolios.”
mapKITE combines the best of both worlds by incorporating aerial and terrestrial components. The aerial component consists of a UA equipped with remote sensing instruments and a navigation guidance and control system. The terrestrial component consists of a human-operated TV that is equipped with remote sensing instruments and a TMMS.

This tandem system operates with the TV, computing a real-time trajectory by means of its real-time navigation system. By doing so, a set of waypoints are generated as route inputs for the UA by converting terrestrial navigation (time, position, velocity and attitude parameters) into UA time and space commands. This process produces a virtual tether by which the UA always follows the vehicle.

Watch this: mapKITE for total 3D mapping

As the UA follows the vehicle at a constant flying height, both can simultaneously collect geo-data. This is then post-processed via an orientation-calibration concept, resulting in the delivery of high-resolution, oriented-calibrated and integrated 3D images of corridors and their surrounding environment.

One of the system’s main benefits is that it lowers surveying budgets. “The mapKITE system does this by means of its Kinematic Ground Control Points (KGCPs), which are obtained directly from the TMMS navigation solution, entailing the elimination of expensive traditional Ground Control Points (GCPs),” explained Molina. “What this means for the user is the longer the corridor mapping mission, the higher the savings are while also keeping similarly accurate results.”

Benefiting from EGNOS and Galileo

The mapKITE system’s combination of both ground and aerial based surveying systems provides users with an integrated and powerful solution. To accomplish this, the project fully exploits such GNSS technology as EGNOS and Galileo. “As an enabling component of mapKITE, EGNOS provides the desired level of accuracy for the terrestrial navigation solution and for the UA guidance,” said GSA Market Development Officer Alina Hriscu, who spoke at the launch event and demonstration, providing the latest insights about European GNSS and its uses for mapping and surveying applications. Hriscu also noted that the Galileo E5 AltBOC signals, which are superior to existing and planned GPS signals, are of particular interest to the mapKITE system because of the robustness they provide against multipath errors at the ground level. This makes them essential for accurate mapping in natural or man-made corridors, something that was confirmed during tests of mapKITE.

“This is a brand new way of acquiring geo-data and processing it in order to derive geo-information that would not make sense without E-GNSS,” added Molina. “We also must highlight the critical role of GNSS timing, due to the need to synchronise the TV’s trajectory solution to the central time of exposure of the UA remote sensing instruments.” 

A game changer

Due to its operational simplicity and cost savings, mapKITE is positioned to be a game changer – a fact clearly on display at the launch event. Here, surveyors saw first-hand how they can cut costs by eliminating the need to independently operate terrestrial and aerial systems. “What we witnessed today was the launch of a new era of drone information technology that will prove to be a game changer in the development of our digital society,” said Jan Skaloud of the Ecole Polytechnique Federal de Lausanne. “The mapKITE system has answered the challenge of linking mobile mapping technology with the airborne mapping technology that is now accessible to users via drones.”

Watch this: Presenting a new mapping paradigm to the world

“If we think about the Internet of Things and Smart Cities, it’s really geospatial data that will become the heartbeat of a city, allowing one to measure and assess what’s going,” added Trimble’s Christian Hoffmann. “Systems like mapKITE, which offers specific vertical applications for corridor mapping or asset management, for example, is the answer to getting this data.”

Engemap, a Brazilian road mapping company and early-adapter of mapKITE, presented a case study of its success using the system. Antonio Lira, project and business manager in Engemap, presented the key features of the Brazilian corridor mapping requirements and market and highlighted how mapKITE absolutely fits as an all-in-one solution. During the two trials, Engemap used a mapKITE prototype to successfully map several kilometres of road, achieving satisfactory levels of efficiency.

“Simply put, the mapKITE idea of combining a mobile system with a classic system of aerial image acquisition is quite brilliant,” concluded Senior Mapping Expert Josep Lluis Colomer.

As mapKITE now turns its focus towards marketization, it has been patented by GeoNumerics in Spain and the US, with patent applications in Europe and Brazil pending.

Media note: This feature can be republished without charge provided the European GNSS Agency (GSA) is acknowledged as the source at the top or the bottom of the story. You must request permission before you use any of the photographs on the site. If you republish, we would be grateful if you could link back to the GSA website (http://www.gsa.europa.eu).

Na indickém kosmodromu Šríharikota pokračují přípravy na páteční start nosné rakety PSLV s družicí Cartosat 2E a třiceti dalšími družicemi. Mezi nimi je první česká nanodružice VZLUSat-1 vyvinutá a postavená odborníky z Výzkumného a zkušebního leteckého ústavu v Praze. Start nosné rakety je plánován na 05:59 SELČ.

Na indickém kosmodromu Satish Dhawan Space Centre, známém spíše pod názvem Šríharikota, právě vrcholí přípravy nosné rakety PSLV k pátečnímu startu. Start by měl proběhnout v 09:29 místního času, tj. 05:59 SELČ.

Ministerstvo pôdohospodárstva a rozvoja vidieka SR predložilo do pripomienkového konania návrh novely zákona o nájme poľnohospodárskych pozemkov

This year, Europe celebrated the 60th anniversary of the signing of the Treaties of Rome - 25 March 1957 was a seminal moment in European integration. Since then, Europe has developed in many unforeseen ways.

The founding fathers may have dreamed of a single European currency and borderless travel – it is less clear if they were thinking of smartphones and earth observation satellites to monitor the environment.

“Maybe they weren’t thinking of a space strategy in 1957; Yuri Gagarin completed the first orbit in 1961,” said GSA Executive Director Carlo des Dorides at a high-level conference in Rome on June 15. “But now – 60 years later – we can say that space has a very good story to tell about European co-operation. Hundreds of thousands of citizens are benefitting from space. People may not know, but Galileo is entering more and more into their daily lives.”

GSA Executive Director Carlo des Dorides speaking at the Rome event

Watch this: Galileo goes live

Roberto Battiston, president of the Italian Space Agency, spoke at the conference on how the EU’s space programmes foster and support industry and research: “Europe has always been the opportunity to achieve together what we could not achieve alone. This was true of the European Space Agency and it is true of the investment in space infrastructure including Galileo and Copernicus.”

Italian Education Minister Valeria Fedeli opened the event, noting that space is a “critically important driver for our economy”. Italy is a good example of how one country is drawing on Europe’s shared infrastructure. Over the coming years, Italy will invest €1 billion in this field; half of this investment will come from private sources.

‘Europe is now the second space power in the world’

Internal Market, Industry, Entrepreneurship and SMEs Commissioner Elżbieta Bieńkowska reflected on the milestones of European Space Policy and programmes. The European Space Strategy adopted at the end of March will build on work done so far to ensure that Europe’s talents, expertise and investments enable Europe to anticipate the opportunities of tomorrow. Bieńkowska said: “Europe is now the second space power in the world”.

Coming back down to Earth, DG GROW’s Deputy Director General for Space Pierre Delsaux reminded us that though we were celebrating the end of roaming charges, many Europeans don’t travel outside their own countries. However, most people use smartphones dependent on satellite navigation or at the very least follow the weather forecast. So whether you are at home or away, Europe’s space policy is making a difference to your life.

Copernicus

Images from Copernicus, the world’s most ambitious earth observation and monitoring programme, were presented at the conference. European Space Agency Director General Jan Woerner referred to the Sentinel satellites as the backbone of the Copernicus programme.

Insights from satellites will play a critical role in many societal challenges, including monitoring the state of the environment to better understand climate change.

Italian Civil Protection Director Fabrizio Curcio, showed how Copernicus data and information supported emergency management activities. Etna eruptions, earthquakes, landslides and floods, but also extraordinary events such as the Costa Concordia wreckage or the Xylella Fastidiosa phytosanitary crisis put Copernicus to the test in real-life and real-time stress tests – the data provided proved invaluable.

ECMWF (European Centre for Medium-Range Forecast) Director General Florence Rabier spoke at the conference on how space policy serves citizens. When created 40 years ago, the aim was to forecast the weather two to ten days ahead – ECMWF can now predict up to a month or several months ahead. Rabier is happy to say: “We can be proud in Europe. Our forecasts are routinely the best – as judged by the World Meteorological Organisation. We can help other countries too – we were the first to detect that Hurricane Sandy would turn and hit the east coast of America.”

The event, while reflective on achievements to date, also looked to the future. The EU’s continued investment in space gives the private sector the confidence to invest. Giovanni Sylos Labini, the CEO of Planetek and Vice Chairman of the European Association of Remote Sensing Companies (EARSC) spoke about space as a motor for economic growth. Labini said that the market is growing rapidly year on year by around 10%, “public investment is crucial, but increasingly private equity and finance is coming in, making investment sustainable.”

Media note: This feature can be republished without charge provided the European GNSS Agency (GSA) is acknowledged as the source at the top or the bottom of the story. You must request permission before you use any of the photographs on the site. If you republish, we would be grateful if you could link back to the GSA website (http://www.gsa.europa.eu).

Following the recent release of GNSS raw measurements on Android Nougat, the European GNSS Agency (GSA) is engaging with the smartest brains in navigation and positioning to innovate around this new feature.

Galileo is now successfully delivering initial positioning services, while device manufacturers have unveiled the first generation of Galileo-ready consumer devices. Therefore, the GSA is now focusing more on its work with application developers to allow EU citizens to benefit from this enhanced Galileo performance.

An interesting development that may enable higher accuracy for mass market devices is the new availability of raw measurements at the Operating System level. Indeed, all new smartphones that feature Android 7.0 (i.e. Nougat) give application developers direct access to raw GNSS measurements. This unique feature allows users to get pseudoranges and Doppler and carrier phase measurements, and opens up the possibility of using alternative strategies for position, velocity and time (PVT) computation, for example by applying corrections to improve accuracy.

Read this: GNSS mobile apps: using Nougat to access raw GNSS measurements

This innovation was eagerly anticipated by the GNSS community. Raw measurements were already accessible on high end professional equipment but never on smartphones. Research centres and universities have immediately started testing the new possibilities that the availability of raw measurements may bring. Just a few months after the Nougat launch, several applications appeared on the market proposing precise point positioning (PPP) solutions for smartphones.

Prague workshop

However, the use of raw measurements is currently still limited to testing and users are mostly GNSS experts that are trying to better understand the real potential of this new feature. Therefore, the GSA has decided to launch a Raw Measurements Task Force to facilitate exchanges, share experience and knowledge around this topic, and promote the use of raw measurements to application developers. The Task Force plans to release a White Paper explaining how GNSS raw measurements can be used to optimise the calculation of position (building on test results), how they can be best corrected, and how they can create opportunities for innovative applications. It will also provide an outlook on the future use of raw measurements, assuming that dual band chipsets become available in smartphones.

The GSA is inviting all interested GNSS experts in academia and research to join a dedicated workshop in Prague on July 20th on the preparation of the GNSS community’s position on raw measurement use in consumer devices.

To register for the one day workshop, or to get more information about the Task Force, please contact Justyna Redelkiewicz at market@gsa.europa.eu.

Media note: This feature can be republished without charge provided the European GNSS Agency (GSA) is acknowledged as the source at the top or the bottom of the story. You must request permission before you use any of the photographs on the site. If you republish, we would be grateful if you could link back to the GSA website (http://www.gsa.europa.eu).

Following the recent release of GNSS raw measurements on Android Nougat, the European GNSS Agency (GSA) is engaging with the smartest brains in navigation and positioning to innovate around this new feature.

Galileo is now successfully delivering initial positioning services, while device manufacturers have unveiled the first generation of Galileo-ready consumer devices. Therefore, the GSA is now focusing more on its work with application developers to allow EU citizens to benefit from this enhanced Galileo performance.

An interesting development that may enable higher accuracy for mass market devices is the new availability of raw measurements at the Operating System level. Indeed, all new smartphones that feature Android 7.0 (i.e. Nougat) give application developers direct access to raw GNSS measurements. This unique feature allows users to get pseudoranges and Doppler and carrier phase measurements, and opens up the possibility of using alternative strategies for position, velocity and time (PVT) computation, for example by applying corrections to improve accuracy.

Read this: GNSS mobile apps: using Nougat to access raw GNSS measurements

This innovation was eagerly anticipated by the GNSS community. Raw measurements were already accessible on high end professional equipment but never on smartphones. Research centres and universities have immediately started testing the new possibilities that the availability of raw measurements may bring. Just a few months after the Nougat launch, several applications appeared on the market proposing precise point positioning (PPP) solutions for smartphones.

Prague workshop

However, the use of raw measurements is currently still limited to testing and users are mostly GNSS experts that are trying to better understand the real potential of this new feature. Therefore, the GSA has decided to launch a Raw Measurements Task Force to facilitate exchanges, share experience and knowledge around this topic, and promote the use of raw measurements to application developers. The Task Force plans to release a White Paper explaining how GNSS raw measurements can be used to optimise the calculation of position (building on test results), how they can be best corrected, and how they can create opportunities for innovative applications. It will also provide an outlook on the future use of raw measurements, assuming that dual band chipsets become available in smartphones.

The GSA is inviting all interested GNSS experts in academia and research to join a dedicated workshop in Prague on July 20th on the preparation of the GNSS community’s position on raw measurement use in consumer devices.

To register for the one day workshop, or to get more information about the Task Force, please contact Justyna Redelkiewicz at market@gsa.europa.eu.

Media note: This feature can be republished without charge provided the European GNSS Agency (GSA) is acknowledged as the source at the top or the bottom of the story. You must request permission before you use any of the photographs on the site. If you republish, we would be grateful if you could link back to the GSA website (http://www.gsa.europa.eu).