Highly accurate evaluation of GPS synchronization for TDOA localization

Clock synchronization is critical for the operation of a distributed wireless network system. In this paper we investigate on a method able to evaluate in real time the synchronization offset between devices down to nanoseconds (as needed for positioning). The method is inspired by signal processing algorithms and relies on fine-grain time information obtained during the reconstruction of the signal at the receiver. Applying the method to a GPS-synchronized system show that GPS-based synchronization has high accuracy potential but still suffers from short-term clock drift, which limits the achievable localization error.