The Institute has a long tradition in performance evaluation, e.g. performing GLONASS integrity monitoring in the late 1990’s. Today, a key activity is the monitoring of the ionosphere. The ionosphere is the second largest source of uncertainty in satellite positioning. The delay due to the plasma of the ionosphere is proportional to the Total Electronic Content (TEC). The Institute is providing an operational TEC service since more than 10 years. This service was recently extended to include gradients in space and time. The current focus is on prediction – a very important aspect for all precision and Safety of Life Services (SoL), e.g. landing of an aircraft.
In the above context, the Institute has developed EVNet – an environment for operating a network of sensors. This network support functions, like data acquisition, data processing and data distribution, as well as the configuration and maintenance of the sensors. The sensors currently used are GPS/GLONASS receivers and meteorological stations. A total of 12 Galileo receivers have been ordered.
EVNet is a basis for monitoring and testing of algorithms in general. The Institute plans to use it in the context of the Performance Evaluation Center (PEC), of SoL Services, and of the Precise Application CEnter (PACE).
The 30 meter antenna of the DLR’s German Space Operation Center (GSOC) is a key instrument for the assessment of individual satellites. It was recently upgraded with L-band feeds, and provides a gain of 50 dB. This raises the SNR of satellite navigation signals well above 20 dB, and allows for a detailed study of those signals. First measurements provided interesting insights.