Global Navigation Satellite System Channel Coding Structures for Rapid Signal Acquisition in Harsh Environmental Conditions

In this article, we present the design of a new navigation message system that includes an error-correcting scheme. This design exploits the “carousel” nature of the broadcast navigation message and facilitates (i) a reduction in the time to first fix (TTFF) and (ii) enhanced error-correcting performance under both favorable and challenging channel conditions. We show here that this combination design requires error-correcting schemes characterized by maximum distance separable (MDS) and full diversity properties. Error-correcting Root low density parity check (Root-LDPC) codes operate efficiently to block various channels and thus can permit efficient and rapid recovery of information over potentially non-ergodic channels. Finally, to ensure appropriate data demodulation in harsh environmental conditions, we propose the use of Root-LDPC codes endowed with a nested property which will permit them to adjust the channel coding rate depending on the number of information blocks received. The proposed error-correcting combination design was then simulated and compared with the well-known GPS L1C subframe 2 using several different transmission scenarios. The results of these simulations revealed some enhancement of the error-correcting performance and reductions in TTFF in several specific situations.