Project Description

The focus of this project will focus on alternative signals of opportunity for positioning navigation and timing applications based on LEO communication satellites signals such as Starlink, Eutelsat OneWeb, Amazon Project Kuiper and Iridium.

Having access to an alternative PNT signals is highly beneficial considering the increasing GNSS malicious interference (jamming and spoofing) resent years. A potential future application is Ku-band reflectometry. The potential added benefit is improving reflectometry compared to GNSS-R (see below). GNSS has 24+ satellites per constellation in medium Earth orbit (MEO) while Starlink, as an example, has a constellation consiting of thousands of satellites in LEO.

Impact
Space technology plays a crucial role in achieving various Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) set by the UN. GNSS-R has the capability to be an all-weather, near real-time detection space-based surveillance system independent clouds and systems based on trust and self-reporting such as AIS. GNSS-R has the potential to allows us to detect and monitor water vessels at sea and localize GNSS inference sources originating from sea or land. This project target

Space technology plays a crucial role in achieving various Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) set by the UN. GNSS-R has the capability to be an all-weather, near real-time detection space-based surveillance system independent clouds and systems based on trust and self-reporting such as AIS. In Norway, space has a crucial role to play in our collective security and monitoring of critical infrastructure and the Arctic region. GNSS-R has the potential to allows us to detect and monitor water vessels at sea and localize GNSS inference sources originating from sea or land. This project target

• SDG9 Industry, innovation, and infrastructure. The outcomes have an innovative and commercial potential for industry and can contribute both to new space-based infrastructure and protection of existing critical infrastructure beyond GNSS.

• SDG16 Peace, justice and strong institutions. Maritime surveillance and GNSS interference monitoring are both relevant for this.

Tasks and Expected Outcomes
The objective of the project is to investigate the PNT properties of LEO Sat Com such as [1]. See also the Institute of Navigation video abstract. The tasks may include

• To a short literature review on signal of opportunity PNT based on LEO communication satellite signals including [1].
• Investigate what equipment will be needed (antenna, SDR etc,) need to decode LEO SatCom signalw
• Singal processing and Doppler tracking.
• Doppler positioning of an antenna based on the subtasks above.

Your work will be affiliated with other students working on GNSS-R related projects is possible. 

Who We Are Looking For
We are seeking a highly motivated final year student in Cybernetics, Electronics, or a related field with an interest either one or several of the topics

• positioning, navigation and timing (PNT) systems 
• signal processing
• estimation and localization

Experience from subjects such as TTK4150 Sensor Fusion and TTT4275 Estimation, detection and classification, in addition to TTT4150 Navigation systems, will be beneficial for the student in this project. Experience with signal processing techniques is not mandatory. The project will be adapted to the student's background and goals. 

How we work
The student will be part of the NTNU SmallSat lab, a lab which typically hosts 10-20 master's student per semester. At the NTNU SmallSat Lab we encourage collaboration and try to get our group to help each other. To facilitate this, we as well as arrange common lunches and workshops where the students and supervisors can learn from each other. I some project we also implement a development process.

Supervisor(s)
For further questions please contact:

• Torleiv H. Bryne(main supervisor, NTNU/ITK), Roger Birkeland (co-supervisor, NTNU/IES),
• Egil Eide (main supervisor, NTNU/IES), Roger Birkeland (co-supervisor, NTNU/IES).

References(s)
[1] Sharbel Kozhaya, Joe Saroufim, and Zaher (Zak) M. Kassas (2025), NAVIGATION: Journal of the Institute of Navigation March 2025, 72 (1) navi.685; DOI: https://doi.org/10.33012/navi.685