Peer-to-peer cooperative GNSS-based localization for stationary reference nodes in wireless sensor networks

Most localization algorithms in wireless sensor networks rely on a few reference nodes with known locations to estimate the locations of unknown nodes. The locations of reference nodes can be either manually configured or, more practically, obtained by means of some satellite-based positioning system(s). However, satellite-based locations may be inaccurate and imprecise, which results in reduced location accuracy of localization algorithms. This paper proposes a peer-to-peer cooperative GNSS-based localization algorithm for stationary reference nodes to improve their relative location accuracy and precision. The algorithm applies simple statistical methods and GNSS-based information from multiple reference nodes within a WSN in a peer-to-peer fashion to achieve the improvement. The results of the experiments indicate that both location precision and relative location accuracy are clearly increased due to the algorithm.