creator Stevanovic, Stefan advisor Pervan, Boris S. This work investigates the potential of the Global Positioning System (GPS) to enable a safe approach for rendezvous applications including shipboard landing of military aircraft. GPS has been shown to have the necessary accuracy for such an operation, and could potentially replace the existing radar or laser based systems. [Kha08][WPF08]1 However, to ensure safe operation, GPS must also be able to avoid hazardous situations. Shipboard aircraft approach navigation is an example rendezvous application requiring both high accuracy and high integrity. In this work, GPS measurement error models and orbit ephemeris fault (OEF) detection algorithms are developed for rendezvous applications, and performance is analyzed for the aircraft shipboard landing application. Both reference station and user based monitors can be used for orbit ephemeris fault detection. The available reference monitors either require a stationary reference receiver, or cannot protect against all types of orbit ephemeris faults. As an alternative, this work develops and investigates the use of receiver autonomous integrity monitoring (RAIM), which is user-based. Two contrasting algorithms, differential RAIM (DRAIM) and relative RAIM (RRAIM) are derived and analyzed for a realistic shipboard landing application. DRAIM is most effective when the aircraft first begins the approach. On the other hand, RRAIM performs best near the end of the approach. Assessing integrity risk is shown to be a major challenge for the RRAIM algorithm. Thus, a new unified RAIM (URAIM) concept is introduced. It seamlessly integrates DRAIM and RRAIM into a single detection algorithm, and also facilitates integrity risk evaluation. This is because the URAIM measurement equation can be used for both position estimation as well as fault detection. 1Corresponding to references in the Bibliography. xii Since high accuracy is desired, fixing integer cycle ambiguities is required. The Enforced Position-Domain Integrity-Risk Cycle Resolution Algorithm (EPIC) method of integrity risk bounding is used along with the URAIM fault detection algorithm in what we call the EPIC-URAIM algorithm. In general, the OEF will interfere with the cycle resolution process. In this work, the EPIC integrity risk bound formula is modified to account for the presence of an OEF. The EPIC-URAIM algorithm is simulated for 1507 sea-based locations around the globe. An average global availability of accuracy and integrity of 98.6% is achieved. This work illustrates the feasibility of detecting orbit ephemeris faults with integrity, while simultaneously meeting stringent accuracy requirements for real-time rendezvous navigation applications. Submitted by Liana Khananashvili (khananashvili@iit.edu) on 2013-10-14T20:58:05Z No. of bitstreams: 2 Stevanovic_MS.pdf: 1144887 bytes, checksum: 3ee016468b7a8f8a3367ce56cd18d048 (MD5) Stevanovic_MS_Titlepage.pdf: 312803 bytes, checksum: 91aba0a9eefe9518d7344e739926e375 (MD5) Made available in DSpace on 2013-10-14T20:58:05Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 Stevanovic_MS.pdf: 1144887 bytes, checksum: 3ee016468b7a8f8a3367ce56cd18d048 (MD5) Stevanovic_MS_Titlepage.pdf: 312803 bytes, checksum: 91aba0a9eefe9518d7344e739926e375 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2013-05 M.S. in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, May 2013 2013-04-18 2013-05 http://hdl.handle.net/10560/3093 en Thesis born digital application/pdf In Copyright http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/ Restricted Access MMAE / Mechanical, Materials, and Aerospace Engineering Illinois Institute of Technology Affiliated department