Global Navigation Satellite Systems Engineering, Policy, and Design
Raytheon Company and Lockheed Martin have successfully completed the first significant integration milestone between Raytheon’s Next Generation GPS Operational Control System (OCX) and Lockheed Martin’s GPS III satellite development.
By Inside GNSS
One of 12 magnetograms recorded at Greenwich Observatory during the Great Geomagnetic Storm of 1859
1996 soccer game in the Midwest, (Rick Dikeman image)
Nouméa ground station after the flood
A pencil and a coffee cup show the size of NASA’s teeny tiny PhoneSat
Bonus Hotspot: Naro Tartaruga AUV
Pacific lamprey spawning (photo by Jeremy Monroe, Fresh Waters Illustrated)
“Return of the Bucentaurn to the Molo on Ascension Day”, by (Giovanni Antonio Canal) Canaletto
The U.S. Naval Observatory Alternate Master Clock at 2nd Space Operations Squadron, Schriever AFB in Colorado. This photo was taken in January, 2006 during the addition of a leap second. The USNO master clocks control GPS timing. They are accurate to within one second every 20 million years (Satellites are so picky! Humans, on the other hand, just want to know if we’re too late for lunch) USAF photo by A1C Jason Ridder. 
Detail of Compass/ BeiDou2 system diagram
Hotspot 6: Beluga A300 600ST
1. DEAD IN THE WATER
San Francisco, California and Washington D.C., USA
Rohde & Schwarz SMBV100A vector signal generator/GNSS simulatorRohde & Schwarz, based in Munich, Germany, has launched two extensions to the GNSS simulator in its SMBV100A vector signal generator: GLONASS and GPS P-code capability.
The SMBV100A already had the capability to generate a range of GPS and Galileo civil signals as well as wireless standards, including GSM/EDGE, 3GPP with HSPA, LTE, Bluetooth, and Wi-Fi.
By Inside GNSS
New GPS III Test Chamber (Lockheed Martin photo)The United States GPS program is without doubt the elder statesman of GNSS, but it has had some close calls recently.
At the 2012 Munich Satellite Navigation Summit in March, a high-level Department of Transportation offical and the head of the Air Force GPS Directorate hailed continuing progress on the Global Positioning System’s third-generation satellite development and next-generation control segment (OCX), while apparently escaping — relatively unscathed — the dual perils of Congressional budget cuts and LightSquared interference.
By Inside GNSS
OPERA neutrino experiment at the Gran Sasso laboratory in Italy. (Photo: LNGS)[Updated March 26, 2012] Six experts debatd the exciting – and controversial – claims of faster-than-light neutrinos from physicists who used the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the world’s largest particle accelerator, in a European experiment that called into question the basics of modern physics.
By Inside GNSS
SBIRS GEO-2 satellite in Baseline Integrated System Test (BIST-1). Lockheed Martin photo.The Air Force is poised to forego putting nuclear detonation detection sensors on the Space-Based Infrared System (SBIRS) satellites, a decision that could complicate efforts to maintain the GPS system by hampering plans to launch multiple, lighter GPS satellites on a single rocket.
By Inside GNSS
GPS Partnership Council golf competition (USAF photo by Joe Juarez)Registration is open for the 2012 GPS Partnership Council meeting at the USAF Space and Missile Systems Center, Los Angeles AFB, on Tuesday, May 1 and Wednesday, May 2. As always, participants can compete in a golf tournament on an optional third day of networking and camaraderie on Wednesday, May 3.
The registration deadline is April 27.
By Inside GNSS
Whenever the annual Munich Satellite Navigation Summit came around, some GNSS program was usually in the ascendant, while others had reversed direction or found themselves treading water. This year, perhaps for the first time, all four major providers had reason to celebrate as the event’s organizers cut the cake at their 10th birthday party.
By Inside GNSS
The University Park Hotel under construction next to the East Midlands Conference CentreThe British Royal Institute of Navigation has given prospective authors a May 4 deadline for abstracts for its annual conference, NAV12. The theme this year is "GNSS and Beyond."
Authors have a broad choice of navigation and technology topics from GNSS, eLoran and integrated systems technology to satellite navigation vulnerabilities to jamming and space weather to low-cost consumer apps design.
By Inside GNSS
Gil Klinger, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Space and Intelligence. DoD photo.As part of an effort to control costs, the U.S. Air Force will be shifting the GPS III program to a fixed-price contract, a Pentagon official told members of a House subcommittee recently.
By Inside GNSS
In a last-ditch effort to salvage its wireless broadband system from official rejection due to interference to GPS, LightSquared Inc. has filed a lengthy rebuttal to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) notice of its plan to withdraw the agency’s conditional approval of the proposed high-power terrestrial network.
By Inside GNSS
In-home construction of the first civilian-owned civil GPS spoofer.Over the last few years, several of us in the GNSS community have done our best to convince our colleagues, policymakers, and the general public that unsavory characters with GNSS jammers or spoofers are a genuine threat to GNSS and an orderly society.
"But who would want to use a jammer or spoofer?” people ask.
My response? Hackers, because they can. Thieves planning to snatch expensive cargo. A moonlighting employee in the company car. Worse yet, state actors or terrorists targeting our national infrastructure.
By Inside GNSS
U.S. Air Force Gen. William Shelton , commander of the Air Force Space Command (AFSPC), told a recent House Armed Services subcommittee hearing that the LightSquared controversy at the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) underlined the need to protect GPS spectrum “Whether it is by policy within the FCC or whether that is by legislation. . . “
Shelton’s comments came during March 8 testimony on the Fiscal Year 2013 National Defense Authorization Budget Request for National Security Space Activities before the Strategic Forces Subcommittee.
By Inside GNSS
