Global Navigation Satellite Systems Engineering, Policy, and Design
The Pentagon has requested $1.3 billion in its fiscal 2024 budget for bolstering the GPS system, preparing new satellites for launch and moving to a new control system. The biggest changes will come with the new GPS IIIF satellites, still a few years away.
By Brett Davis
GPS, even when encrypted, is susceptible to spoofing and jamming and cannot be a single point of failure in critical PNT services such as military applications. Secure, resilient and assured PNT with six 9’s reliability is required, and is what ADVA and Brandywine Communications will provide through a new collaboration.
By Renee Knight
The DOD’s Defense Spectrum Office (DSO) recently contracted iPosi and Virginia Tech Applied Research Corporation (VT-ARC) to develop a GPS/GNSS system that measures radio frequency (RF) path-loss, with the goal of increasing shared spectrum without interference.
By Inside GNSS
U.S. military efforts to field jam-resistant GPS weaponry not only run behind schedule, they continue to fall back, according to the annual report from the Department of Defense (DoD) Director, Operational Test and Evaluation (DOT&E) Nickolas Guertin. Because “the lack of M-code capable receivers limits the M-code use by U.S. and allied warfighters,” branches of the Armed Forces are now sourcing directly from commercial suppliers.
By Inside GNSS
Scientists at Draper Laboratory have patented a celestial navigation system called a sliced-lens star tracker, which in its early form can achieve 50-meter accuracy in GNSS-denied environments. Improvements are expected as the technology evolves. Vehicles of all kinds may be able to benefit when using this system for navigating by the stars.
By Inside GNSS
The Air Force Research Laboratory’s complementary PNT AgilePod prototype aced its first high-dynamic flight tests in November 2021. It also achieved two other firsts: the first test of fully-remote interfacing and alt-PNT data transmission, and the first demonstration of overland/overwater transition performance.
By Inside GNSS
The Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) has executed a $316 million contract option for BAE Systems’ advanced M-Code GPS modules, raising the contract funding to $641 million.
By Inside GNSS
Russia conducted an unannounced direct-ascent anti-satellite (DA-ASAT) missile test on November 15, targeting and exploding its own defunct satellite Tselina-D. After the test, Russian television executive and spokesperson Dmitry Konstantinovich Kiselyov, head of the official Russian government-owned international news agency Rossiya Segodnya, reportedly said on live tv that this demonstrated that Russia could and would if necessary target U.S. GPS satellites, thus “blinding” its military forces.
By Inside GNSS
The U.S. Navy’s Office of Naval Research (ONR) Global announced the winner of its second Global-X Challenge, kicking off a proof-of-concept effort on an alternative navigation system using muons in the Arctic to gain precision equal to that of GPS.
By Inside GNSS
Northrop Grumman PNT experts are using artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) to develop new software to combat jamming and spoofing threats to navigation systems in contested battlefield environments.
By Inside GNSS
The U.S. Army has put its replacement for the handheld Defense Advanced GPS Receiver (DAGR) under field testing in reconnaissance and fire missions in a variety of threat scenarios, to understand its performance in a realistic operational environment. The Dismounted Assured Positioning, Navigation, and Timing System (DAPS) could enable warfighters to better shoot, move and communicate in a GPS degraded environment.
By Inside GNSS
The U.S. Army Research Lab awarded the University of Central Florida a $4.5 million grant to develop a smart, computer vision-based navigation system for when GPS is unavailable or jammed.
By Inside GNSS
Collins Aerospace announced its Military Underwater Navigation System with M-Code (MUNS-M), a handheld diver navigation system that provides the diver with precise position and includes secure anti-jamming capabilities during deep-sea missions.
By Inside GNSS
In a robust return to live technical conferences, the 2021 Joint Navigation Conference (JNC 2021) drew strong attendance and lively, productive conversations on the show floor.
By Inside GNSS
BAE Systems, Inc. unveiled its ultra-small MicroGRAM-M GPS receiver compatible with next-generation M-Code military GPS signals that are resistant to jamming and spoofing.
By Inside GNSS
