R. Michael Buehrer

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    Zack Is Defending His Master's Thesis

    Time: Thursday, May 2, 2013 10 AM
    Location: Durham 430
    Abstract: The localization of wireless devices, i.e. mobile phones, laptops, and handheld GPS receivers, has gained much interest due to the benefits it provides, including quicker emergency personnel dispatch, location-aided routing, as well as commercial revenue opportunities through location based services. GPS is the dominant position location system in operation, with 31 operational satellites producing eight line of sight satellites available to users at all times making it very favorable for system implementation in all wireless networks. Unfortunately when a GPS receiver is in a challenging environment, such as an urban or indoor scenario, the signal quality often degrades causing poor accuracy in the position estimate or failure to localize altogether due to satellite availability.
    Our goal is to introduce a new solution that has the ability to overcome this limitation by improving the accuracy and availability of a GPS receiver when in a challenging environment. To test this theory we created a simulated GPS receiver using a MATLAB simulation to mimic a standard GPS receiver with all 31 operational satellites. Here we are able to alter the environment of the user and examine the errors that occur due to noise and limited satellite availability. Then we introduce additional user(s) to the GPS solution with the knowledge (or estimate) of the distances between the users. The new solutions use inter-receiver distances along with pseudoranges to cooperatively determine all receiver locations simultaneously, resulting in improvement in both the accuracy of the position estimate and availability.

    The 1st Contest on Localization Algorithms

    Our research team including Reza Monir Vaghefi, Javier Schloemann, and R. Michael Buehrer won the 1st Contest on Localization Algorithms in Dresden on 19th of March. The contest was hosted by the 10th Workshop on Positioning, Navigation and Communication 2013 (WPNC'13) in Dresden, Germany, March 20-21, 2013 in cooperation with BUTLER FP7 EU project. The participants compared their localization algorithms based on given distance datasets and evaluation metrics.

    DARPA Spectrum Challenge

    SaiDhiraj Amuru, Daniel Jakubisin, Jeffrey Poston, and R. Michael Buehrer, the members of the team VT CogRad, were qualified for the DARPA Spectrum Challenge tournaments. 90 teams registered as Challenge entrants, with participants from around the world. However, only 15 teams were selected as contestants for the Challenge tournaments where VT CogRad ranked 11th. The DARPA Spectrum Challenge is a competition to demonstrate a radio protocol that can best use a given communication channel in the presence of other dynamic users and interfering signals.