GPS Positioning Networks Design: An Application of the Ant Colony System

Abstract

The Global Positioning System (GPS) positioning network problem can briefly defined as follows. A number of receivers are placed at stations to be coordinated by determining sessions between these stations. A session can be defined as a period oftime during which two or more receivers simultaneously record satellite signals for a fixed duration. After a certain time of observation, the receivers are then moved to other stations for further measurements. This process of sessions observation continues till the whole network is completely observed. The problem is to search for the best order in which these sessions can be organized to give the cheapest schedule i.e., Minimize: C(V), where C(V ) is the total cost of a feasible schedule V.