A Hybrid Lunar Orbital Satellite and Wireless Communication Method for Continuous Lunar Surface Positioning

Cong Hu, Zhenni Li, Shengli Xie, Maodeng Li, Xiongwen He, Chaoji Chen, Zhaofeng Zhong

Abstract:	In recent years, China’s Chang’e-6 mission successfully achieved the world’s first sample return from the far side of the Moon, marking a significant milestone in deep space exploration. As future lunar missions continue to grow in complexity and scale, higher demands are being placed on lunar positioning technologies. However, due to the limited number of lunar satellites initially deployed, current positioning systems can only provide support during specific time windows, making it difficult to meet the need for continuous positioning throughout exploration tasks. To address the above problem, this paper proposes a continuous lunar surface positioning method that integrates lunar orbiting satellites and 5G signals. The method adopts a two-stage Extended Kalman Filter algorithm: in the first stage, high-frequency 5G measurements are used to achieve fast positioning of the rover; in the second stage, low-frequency but high-precision satellite measurements are employed to correct the positioning results from the first stage. This method does not rely on a fixed number of visible satellites and fully leverages the advantages of fast 5G responsiveness and high-precision satellite measurements. To validate the effectiveness of the proposed method, a lunar satellite orbit simulation environment is first constructed, followed by 5G signal propagation simulation based on a lunar Digital Elevation Model. Finally, the positioning performance was evaluated using the simulated data. Experimental results show that when using 5G signals alone, the horizontal positioning accuracy reaches 4.43 meters. With the proposed hybrid method, continuous and high-precision positioning can still be achieved under limited satellite availability, improving the horizontal positioning accuracy to 4.11 meters. This method enhances the availability and accuracy of positioning in the lunar environment, providing a feasible solution for future lunar exploration missions.
Published in:	Proceedings of the 38th International Technical Meeting of the Satellite Division of The Institute of Navigation (ION GNSS+ 2025) September 8 - 12, 2025 Hilton Baltimore Inner Harbor Baltimore, Maryland
Pages:	703 - 715
Cite this article:	Hu, Cong, Li, Zhenni, Xie, Shengli, Li, Maodeng, He, Xiongwen, Chen, Chaoji, Zhong, Zhaofeng, "A Hybrid Lunar Orbital Satellite and Wireless Communication Method for Continuous Lunar Surface Positioning," Proceedings of the 38th International Technical Meeting of the Satellite Division of The Institute of Navigation (ION GNSS+ 2025), Baltimore, Maryland, September 2025, pp. 703-715. https://doi.org/10.33012/2025.20315
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