SUO/SAS Geolocation: Land Navigation Using Multiple Integrated Sensors

Evans Jacobson, Tracy Lee, Charles Popeck, Marc Martorana and Stan Sokolowski

Abstract:	The Small Unit Operations/Situation Awareness System (SUO/SAS) was developed by the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency (DARPA) to address the future needs of individual soldiers on an increasingly complex and lethal battlefield. As tactical operations have shifted toward smaller units, the importance of force multipliers has concomitantly increased. One such force multiplier is the ability of a soldier operating in a restricted environment to constantly know the location of both friendly and enemy soldiers. The SUO/SAS Geolocation System was designed to provide continuous reliable geolocation data in the many different restrictive environments which might be encountered by a soldier in modern warfare. The SUO/SAS Geolocation System integrates multiple sensors to provide a continuous solution in multiple environments. For open environments, the Geolocation System may rely on GPS. But for those areas (such as inside a building) where GPS signals are not available, a combination of other sensors are provided. Range measurements are provided by Time-of-Arrival (TOA) transceivers, and altitude information is provided by a barometric altimeter. Velocity is maintained via an IMU, and heading information is provided by a digital magnetic compass. All of this information is integrated into a single navigation Kalman Filter to provide an optimal solution. During December 2000, Rockwell Collins and ITT under the auspices of DARPA conducted extensive testing of the SUO/SAS Geolocation System. This testing was intended to characterize the performance of the system in various environments – Open, Suburban, and Indoor. Various combinations of sensors were used in each environment to determine the performance which might be achieved. This paper presents the architecture of the SUO/SAS Geolocation System, the results of testing, and lessons learned from the testing.
Published in:	Proceedings of the 57th Annual Meeting of The Institute of Navigation (2001) June 11 - 13, 2001 Albuquerque, NM
Pages:	622 - 633
Cite this article:	Jacobson, Evans, Lee, Tracy, Popeck, Charles, Martorana, Marc, Sokolowski, Stan, "SUO/SAS Geolocation: Land Navigation Using Multiple Integrated Sensors," Proceedings of the 57th Annual Meeting of The Institute of Navigation (2001), Albuquerque, NM, June 2001, pp. 622-633.
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