A UWB navigation system aided by sensor-based autonomous algorithm - Deployment and experiment in shopping mall

Demands for indoor-localization or indoor-navigation are increasing in many fields such as a marketing, shopping related industries, and anticrime application. At present, many types of technologies of indoor-localization or indoor-navigation are proposed. Some examples are those that use ultrasonic waves, Wi-Fi, or IR-UWB. In this paper, we focus on IR-UWB technology because of its great potential on high precision ranging, which is within several 10cm. However, a distance surveying fluctuation due to multipath effect may reduce the ranging precision. Multipath effect occur by smooth surface wall or glare items in indoor environment. To avoid multipath effect, we adopt sensor-based autonomous algorithm to assist UWB navigation. We deployed the overall navigation system in a shopping mall. Preliminary evaluation experiments were performed. As a result, the combined IR-UWB and autonomous algorithm system shows good navigation performance. The autonomous algorithm can reduce multipath effect. As compared with using only IR-UWB, the localization errors of applied autonomous algorithm decreased by 12.6% maximum.