An evaluation of UWB localization under non line-of-sight (NLOS) propagation

In this paper we evaluate the statistical performances of the association of a low-complexity of the time of arrival (TOA) estimation algorithm and the location estimation algorithm in a non line-of-sight (NLOS) indoor environment. For that, we choose the time hopping (TH) code and pulse amplitude modulation (PAM) for ultra wideband (UWB) symbols and the IEEE802.15.3a models (CM1 and CM3) for the channel propagation. The numerical simulations show that the accuracy of TOA estimation can be achieved with only one training symbol period for data aided (DA) mode in LOS propagation (CM1). These performances are seriously degraded in NLOS propagation (CM3). Otherwise, the obtained results show the harmful effect of increasing the number of NLOS nodes (basic stations) on the positioning accuracy.