UWB-based indoor 3D position estimation for future generation communication applications

In this work, we present a 3D extension to a previously proposed indoor 2D UWB-based elliptical localisation (EL) technique. As we show in this paper, by honing in on UWB's inherent properties, the 3D position of a node of interest (NOI) is determined by splitting the 3D solution space into two independent 2D solution spaces; and thereafter range measurements are made based on the combination of a single transmitter and three receivers that are placed in the environment of interest. More significantly, we once again illustrate that by considering the properties of UWB in the design process, the hardware requirement which for 3D positioning is currently set to at least four receivers and one transmitter, can be reduced.