Globalization highlight: orbit determination using BeiDou inter-satellite ranging measurements

The BeiDou Navigation Satellite System is expected to provide a global positioning and navigation service by 2020. To achieve this goal, the new-generation navigation satellites that have been launched since March 2015 are equipped with inter-satellite links (ISLs), with the objective of testing new navigation signals and the ISLs themselves. Using these new-generation navigation satellites and several ground facilities in China, a combined orbit determination experiment was carried out during August 2016. The orbit mechanical model, orbit determination method, and accuracy evaluation method used in this experiment are presented here. The accuracy of the combined orbit determination method is evaluated, and the performance-related improvements resulting from the ISLs are analyzed. The performance of orbit determination has been increased about 37–76% for different satellites in orbit-only signal-in-space range error (orbit-only SISRE).