Forthcoming Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite networks such as Starlink's Mobile Satellite Service (MSS) will incorporate the New Radio (NR) Non-Terrestrial Network (NTN) standard. The Synchronization Signal Block (SSB) specified as part of NR is periodically broadcast for cell search and initial access. We propose to exploit the SSB for opportunistic receiver positioning. Doppler shift measurements are modeled and pseudoranges are derived from SSB while also taking into account the receiver's clock bias and drift. The resulting per satellite integer ambiguity in the pseudorange is resolved by geometry alone, without inter-satellite differencing or an a-priori position. Measurements are taken from SSBs of multiple satellites and at multiple occasions per satellite, whereby the SSBs are subject to different transmission timings and varying propagation delays. Finally, a simulation model is developed for positioning based on the actual Starlink constellation and the NR NTN standard to evaluate the positioning accuracy to be expected. The proposed approach achieves a mean positioning error of less than 10m without requiring any modification of the NR NTN standard.
Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellites have emerged as a promising complement to GNSS for positioning in signal challenged environments. In sparse LEO signals of opportunity scenarios, Doppler positioning often relies on only one or two satellite passes, making positioning accuracy hig…
As low Earth orbit (LEO) satellite communications take shape on a global scale, system-level evaluation has become essential for a rigorous understanding of their performance characteristics. Most existing studies have relied on a full-buffer assumption, which obscures the hetero…
Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV)-based antenna measurement systems provide a flexible and cost-effective alternative to conventional antenna test ranges for characterizing large and installed antennas. However, their accuracy depends on precise UAV positioning and efficient flight-t…
Interference is a limiting factor in the emerging dense low Earth orbit (LEO) networks. In the LEO network, the interference is spatially and temporally correlated. At narrow-beam LEO base stations (BSs), spatial interference can vary significantly, and multipath fading introduce…
Coherent free-space optical (FSO) communication is a promising solution for low Earth orbit (LEO) satellite downlink transmission. However, high orbital velocity introduces multi-GHz Doppler shifts that appear as a rapidly time-varying carrier frequency offset (CFO), which is a m…
Low-Earth-orbit (LEO) relay networks deliver finite objects -- sensing tiles, telemetry blocks, model updates, and checkpoints -- over intermittent inter-satellite and space-to-ground contact plans. Partial delivery is insufficient when the complete object misses its deadline. Wh…