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Real-time tropospheric delay map retrieval using sparse GNSS stations

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Abstract

Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) is one of the popular approaches for zenith tropospheric delay (ZTD) retrieval due to its advantages of high precision and high temporal resolution. However, obtaining ZTD maps with high spatial resolution and high precision from sparse GNSS stations is greatly challenging, and related studies for areas with large height difference areas are never investigated. Here we present a real-time high-precision ZTD (RHZ) model for generating high-resolution regional ZTD maps from sparse GNSS stations. The model is divided into three modules: real-time calibration, co-estimation, and SCHA-based fitting. The real-time calibration module is mainly responsible for enriching the spatial information of the modeling data through the corrected GTrop model. The output virtual ZTD obtained from real-time calibration module and the GNSS-derived ZTD are then used for modeling by spherical cap harmonic analysis (SCHA, i.e., SCHA-based fitting module) after adaptively determining the weighting, which is performed in the co-estimation module. The North America region (30°N–49°N, 125°W–101°W) with complex terrain and dense GNSS stations was selected as the experiment area, and only 229 of 1833 GNSS stations were selected to simulate sparse station conditions (about 140 km station spacing). The numerical results show that the ZTD series derived from the RHZ model is consistent with that from GNSS at different elevation groups, with an average root mean square (RMS) and Bias of 11.49 and 0.82 mm, respectively. In addition, the ZTD maps derived from RHZ model have great spatial performance, and the comparison results with ERA5 show the average RMS and Bias of 14.98 and − 9.94 mm, respectively.

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Data availability

The GNSS data can be downloaded from the Nevada Geodetic Laboratory (NGL) (http://geodesy.unr.edu/gps_timeseries/trop/). The ERA5 reanalysis data are available from the Copernicus Climate Data Store (https://cds.climate.copernicus.eu/). The other datasets generated and analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to thank the NGL and ECMWF for providing the related data.

Funding

This study was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (42330105 and 42274039), Shaanxi Provincial Innovation Capacity Support Plan Project (2023KJXX-050), and Local special scientific research plan project of Shaanxi Provincial Department of Education (22JE012).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Geodesy and Geomatics, Wuhan University, Wuhan, 430072, China

    Zheng Du, Yibin Yao & Hang Zhu

  2. College of Geomatics, Xi’an University of Science and Technology, Xi’an, 710054, China

    Qingzhi Zhao

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  1. Zheng Du
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  4. Hang Zhu
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Contributions

ZD and QZ wrote the main manuscript text, ZD prepared the figures, QZ, YY, and HZ review and editing the manuscript. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Yibin Yao.

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Du, Z., Zhao, Q., Yao, Y. et al. Real-time tropospheric delay map retrieval using sparse GNSS stations. GPS Solut 28, 12 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10291-023-01554-x

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