Single range aided navigation and source localization: Observability and filter design

This paper addresses the problems of navigation and source localization by mobile agents based on the range to a single source, in addition to relative velocity readings. The contribution of the paper is two-fold: (i) necessary and sufficient conditions on the observability of the nonlinear system are derived, which are useful for trajectory planning and motion control of the agent; and (ii) a nonlinear system, which given the input and output of the system is regarded as linear time-varying, is proposed and a Kalman filter is applied to successfully estimate the system state. Simulation results are presented in the presence of realistic measurement noise that illustrate the performance achieved with the proposed solution. (C) 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.