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The Fall 2023 issue of the US Institute of Navigation (ION) NAVIGATION journal features a technical overview paper of the SuperGPS-project, and reports actual results obtained with the prototype-system on the TU Delft campus. The paper ‘Decimeter Positioning in an Urban Environment Through a Scalable Optical-Wireless Network’ has been published Open Access, and is available through https://navi.ion.org/content/70/3/navi.589.

Nature

In its November 17th, 2022 issue, Nature published an article on the SuperGPS-project: ‘A hybrid optical–wireless network for decimetre-level terrestrial positioning’. Rather than using satellites, the system relies on terrestrial transmitters, such as telecommunication base-stations, to broadcast radio-signals to mobile users. The transmitter base-stations are synchronized to an atomic clock over an optical network. Nature, Vol. 611, pp. 473-478.

The submitted manuscript of the paper (accepted for publication), is available through preprint server arXiv.org: http://arxiv.org/abs/2305.14796.

SuperGPS-2 – project granted

In November 2022 the Dutch Research Council (NWO) granted the follow-up project on SuperGPS: ‘Accurate positioning and time-transfer using virtual ultra-wideband radio signals’. The project, with 2 PhD-students and 1 PostDoc, will be carried out by TU Delft, and focus on the design and implementation of radio signals which are sparse in frequency, with a low duty cycle in time.

SuperGPS – the movie

To conclude the project we created a short ‘home-video’ of the SuperGPS-system, now better known as the Terrestrial Networked Positioning System (TNPS). This video presents, in just 5 minutes, an introduction to the system, as well as a summary of results obtained with the prototype, deployed at the TU Delft campus. The project was funded by the Dutch Research Council NWO.

GPS World

The May 2022 issue of the professional magazine GPS World features a paper on SuperGPS. In this paper the system-concept is outlined and experimental results obtained at The Green Village are presented. The paper, written for a wider technical audience, can be found on pages 44-49.

Doctoral thesis defence

On October 4th, 2021, Han Dun successfully defended his doctoral thesis ‘High Accuracy Terrestrial Positioning Based on Time Delay and Carrier Phase Using Wideband Radio Signals’ for a committee of five independent expert-members, three of which from abroad and two from TU Delft, and his two promotors. After the ‘hora est’, the committee was unanimous and outspoken in awarding the doctoral degree to Han Dun. Congratulations!

The PhD-thesis of Han Dun is available through the TU Delft repository.

GPS without satellites - Zelfrijdend zonder brokken (in Dutch)
Interview by Amanda Verdonk with Christian Tiberius and Gerard Janssen in 'De Ingenieur'
De Ingenieur, No 11, November 2020, Volume 132
publication by the Royal Netherlands Society of Engineers (KIVI) - The Hague

The interview was taken, in September, while we were deploying and testing the prototype system at The Green Village, the outdoor living lab on the TU Delft campus. Transmitters were fixed to six roadside lampposts and positioning experiments were carried out with a receiver both in static and kinematic mode.

SuperGPS - super accurate positioning via optical network
In December 2020 a short interview by Jan Michielsen was published as a SURF use case: SuperGPS - super accurate positioning via optical network.

SuperGPS prototype at test at The Green Village
In August and September 2020 several tests were carried-out with the SuperGPS-prototype at The Green Village, which is a living outdoor lab at the TU Delft campus.