G-SPHERE-S GNSS: New GNSS Receiver for Operational Orbit Restitution of MICROSCOPE Satellite

Thomas Junique, Romain Mathieu, David Pascal, Pierre-Yves Guidotti, Yves Andre, Philippe Bataille

Peer Reviewed

Abstract:	G-SPHERE-S GNSS receiver is a new spatial GNSS receiver developed by SYRLINKS (FRANCE). This receiver is one of the main equipment which allows accurate operational orbit restitution and timing on MICROSCOPE satellite (this orbit restitution is not done in real time but with a post processing tool in CNES). The boarding on MICROSCOPE constitutes the first flight of this GNSS receiver. MICROSCOPE is a microsatellite, from CNES (French Space Agency) launched by a Soyuz rocket in April 2016 from Kourou (GUYANA). The main mission of MICROSCOPE is to verify the Einstein equivalence principle, related to gravitational versus inertial mass, with an accuracy never reached before. MICROSCOPE has a mass of 300 kg and its altitude is about 710 km (Low Earth Orbit). The orbit is an 18h Sun-synchronous circular orbit. The overall GNSS subsystem “G-SPHERE-S GNSS” will be presented in this paper. Firstly, the design and the functioning of the GNSS receiver will be shown; then we will discuss the performances and the results obtained with the receiver on MICROSCOPE since the launch in April 2016. The standalone performances of this GNSS receiver and the precise orbit restitution (calculated with post processing tool in CNES) will be analyzed in the different parts of the paper. Finally, we will address the possibilities and the future of this receiver. We have already collected data from G-SPHERE-S GNSS over the past six months on MICROSCOPE. Using our analysis tools, we can confirm that the first results are very impressive with a good PVT (Position, Velocity, Time) availability of 99.5 % and a TTFF (Time To First Fix) regularly measured lower than 100 seconds.
Published in:	Proceedings of the 2017 International Technical Meeting of The Institute of Navigation January 30 - 2, 2017 Hyatt Regency Monterey Monterey, California
Pages:	150 - 161
Cite this article:	Junique, Thomas, Mathieu, Romain, Pascal, David, Guidotti, Pierre-Yves, Andre, Yves, Bataille, Philippe, "G-SPHERE-S GNSS: New GNSS Receiver for Operational Orbit Restitution of MICROSCOPE Satellite," Proceedings of the 2017 International Technical Meeting of The Institute of Navigation, Monterey, California, January 2017, pp. 150-161. https://doi.org/10.33012/2017.14905
Full Paper:	ION Members/Non-Members: 1 Download Credit Sign In