Systems and methods for determining quality and integrity of source information to determine navigation information of an object

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10386202-B2
Application number	US-201715435412-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Feb 17, 2017
Priority date	Feb 17, 2017
Publication date	Aug 20, 2019
Grant date	Aug 20, 2019

Abstract

A navigation system for determining quality and integrity of source information includes one or more data sources that provide the source information, a situation module that provides situation data, an information module that determines an estimate of the quality and an estimate of the integrity of the source information based on the source information and the situation data, an integrity monitor module that determines the integrity and the quality of the source information based on the estimate of the quality and the estimate of the integrity of the source information from the information module, and that validates the source information based on the integrity of the source information and/or the quality of the source information, and a navigation state estimator that determines the navigation information of the one or more objects based on the validated source information and corresponding quality of the source information received from the integrity monitor module.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A navigation system for determining quality and integrity of source information to determine navigation information of one or more objects, the system comprising:
one or more data sources, each data source configured to provide the source information;
a situation module configured to provide situation data;
an information module configured to determine an estimate of the quality and an estimate of the integrity of the source information, at a given time, based on the source information received from the one or more data sources and based on the situation data received from the situation module;
an integrity monitor module
configured to receive the estimate of the quality and the estimate of the integrity of the source information from the information module and to receive the source information from the one or more data sources,
configured to determine the integrity and the quality of the source information based on the estimate of the quality and the estimate of the integrity of the source information from the information module, and
configured to validate the source information based on (1) the integrity of the source information, (2) the quality of the source information, or (3) both the integrity and the quality of the source information; and

a navigation state estimator configured to determine the navigation information of the one or more objects based on the source information that was validated and corresponding quality of the source information received from the integrity monitor module.

2. The navigation system of claim 1 , wherein
the one or more data sources are further configured to provide (1) the quality of the source information, (2) the integrity of the source information, or (3) both the quality and the integrity of the source information;
the information module is further configured to receive (1) the quality of the source information from the one or more data sources, (2) the integrity of the source information from the one or more data sources, or (3) both the quality and the integrity of the source information from the one or more data sources and configured to determine the estimate of the quality and the estimate of the integrity of the source information further based on (1) the quality of the source information from the one or more data sources, (2) the integrity of the source information from the one or more data sources, or (3) both the quality and the integrity of the source information from the one or more data sources; and
the integrity monitor module is further configured to receive (1) the quality of the source information from the one or more data sources, (2) the integrity of the source information from the one or more data sources, or (3) both the quality and the integrity of the source information from the one or more data sources and configured to determine the integrity and the quality of the source information further based on (1) the quality of the source information from the one or more data sources, (2) the integrity of the source information from the one or more data sources, or (3) both the quality and the integrity of the source information from the one or more data sources.

3. The navigation system of claim 2 , wherein the integrity monitor module is further configured to determine whether (1) to use the source information from the one or more data sources or (2) to process at least a portion of the source information and to use the processed source information, based on the estimate of the quality and the estimate of the integrity of the source information from the information module and (1) the quality of the source information from the one or more data sources, (2) the integrity of the source information from the one or more data sources, or (3) both the quality and the integrity of the source information from the one or more data sources.

4. The navigation system of claim 2 , wherein
the navigation state estimator is further configured to provide the navigation information of the one or more objects to the integrity monitor module, and
the integrity monitor module is configured to determine the integrity and the quality of the source information further based on the navigation information.

5. The navigation system of claim 2 , wherein the integrity monitor module is further configured to compare (1) the integrity of the source information from the one or more data sources, (2) the quality of the source information from the one or more data sources, or (3) both the integrity and the quality of the source information from the one or more data sources, to (1) the estimate of the integrity from the information module, (2) the estimate of the quality from the information module, or (3) both the estimate of the integrity and the estimate of the quality from the information module, in order to determine the integrity and the quality of the source information.

6. The navigation system of claim 5 , wherein the integrity monitor module is configured to ignore the source information from the one or more data sources when a difference between a value of the source information and an expected value of the source information differs by more than a threshold value.

7. The navigation system of claim 2 , wherein the information module is further configured to replace (1) the integrity of the source information from the one or more data sources, (2) the quality of the source information from the one or more data sources, or (3) both the integrity and the quality of the source information from the one or more data sources, when determining the estimate of the quality and the estimate of the integrity of the source information.

8. The navigation system of claim 1 , wherein the integrity monitor module is further configured to validate the source information when the quality of the source information falls within a predetermined acceptable range.

9. The navigation system of claim 1 , wherein the integrity monitor module is further configured to determine whether (1) to use the source information from the one or more data sources or (2) to process at least a portion of the source information and to use the processed source information, based on the estimate of the quality and the estimate of the integrity of the source information from the information module.

10. The navigation system of claim 1 , wherein
the navigation state estimator is further configured to provide the navigation information of the one or more objects to the integrity monitor module, and
the integrity monitor module is configured to determine the integrity and the quality of the source information further based on the navigation information.

11. The navigation system of claim 1 , wherein the information module is further configured to maintain a dynamic state and a probabilistic state of the source information based on the situation data, wherein the information module is configured to determine the estimate of the quality and the estimate of the integrity further based on the dynamic state and the probabilistic state of the source information when the situation data establishes that the source information was obtained in a known situation, and the information module is configured to determine the estimate of the quality and the estimate of the integrity further based on the probabilistic state of the source information when the situation data establishes that the source information was obtained in an uncertain situation.

12. The navigation system of claim 1 , wherein the navigation information includes geolocation, velocity, altitude, errors in position, errors in velocity, errors in attitude, time, clock errors, propagation delays, GPS satellite errors

Assignees

• Charles Stark Draper Laboratory Inc

Inventors

• Aucoin Michael
• Laine Juha-Pekka J

Classifications

• G01C21/28

  with correlation of data from several navigational instruments · CPC title

• G01C21/005

  with correlation of navigation data from several sources, e.g. map or contour matching (G01C21/30 takes precedence) · CPC title

• G01S19/20

  Integrity monitoring, fault detection or fault isolation of space segment · CPC title

• G01C25/00 Primary

  Manufacturing, calibrating, cleaning, or repairing instruments or devices referred to in the other groups of this subclass (testing, calibrating or compensating compasses G01C17/38) · CPC title

• G01C21/20 Primary

  Instruments for performing navigational calculations (G01C21/24, G01C21/26 take precedence) · CPC title