Experimental results on cooperative UWB based positioning systems

In this paper, we consider localization using the ultrawide bandwidth (UWB) technology in a typical indoor environment scenario, where ranging is subject to estimation error and excess delay. We investigate how the localization accuracy is affected by the number of beacons and by the availability of a priori information about the environment and network geometry. We also examine the case where multiple targets are present in the same environment and cooperate by measuring ranges not only from the beacons but also from each other. An iterative multi-lateration algorithm that incorporates information gathered through cooperation is then proposed with the purpose of improving the localization accuracy. In the numerical results, experimental data are used to assess the performance of the algorithms.