Pedestrian Navigation Using Waist-Mounted IMU and RTK

Inertial navigation systems (INSs) play a crucial role in global navigation satellite system (GNSS)-denied environments, including individual soldier positioning, emergency rescue, and healthcare applications. However, the accumulation of localization errors over time due to inertial sensor noise remains a significant challenge. This article presents a novel navigation and positioning method integrating real-time kinematic (RTK) and pedestrian dead reckoning (PDR). The proposed approach leverages RTK to precisely determine the true heading over short distances and time intervals, thereby enhancing the accuracy of the initial heading estimation. Furthermore, a real-time heading correction algorithm based on RTK is developed to mitigate heading drift in PDR. Experimental results demonstrate that the method achieves an initial heading error of 0.18° within 8 m of straight walking and a positioning error of 0.51 m after 800 m. This approach holds substantial potential for high-precision indoor and outdoor seamless positioning applications.