SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR LOCATING, TRACKING, AND/OR MONITORING THE STATUS OF PERSONNEL AND/OR ASSETS BOTH INDOORS AND OUTDOORS

• US 20090043504A1
• Filed: 08/06/2008
• Published: 02/12/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 05/31/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Amrit Bandyopadhyay, Benjamin E. Funk, Carole A. Teolis, Daniel Hakim, Eric Asher Kohn, Gilmer Blankenship
• Original Assignee: TRX Systems, Inc.
• Inventors: Blankenship, Gilmer, Kohn, Eric Asher, Hakim, Daniel, Teolis, Carole A., Funk, Benjamin E., BANDYOPADHYAY, AMRIT
• Granted Patent: US 9,448,072 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 701/213
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 17/38 Testing, calibrating, or compensating of compasses
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/1652 with ranging devices, e.g. LIDAR or RADAR
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/1654 with electromagnetic compass
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/188 for accumulated errors, e.g. by coupling inertial systems with absolute positioning systems
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/206 specially adapted for indoor navigation
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/3438 Rendez-vous, i.e. searching a destination where several users can meet, and the routes to this destination for these users; Ride sharing, i.e. searching a route such that at least two users can share a vehicle for at least part of the route
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/3626 Details of the output of route guidance instructions traffic control systems for road vehicles involving transmission of navigation instructions to the vehicle G08G1/0968
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 19/48 by combining or switching between position solutions derived from the satellite radio beacon positioning system and position solutions derived from a further system
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 19/49 whereby the further system is an inertial position system, e.g. loosely-coupled
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 5/015 between indoor and outdoor environments
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 5/0294 Trajectory determination or predictive filtering, e.g. target tracking or Kalman filtering
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/021 Services related to particular areas, e.g. point of interest [POI] services, venue services or geofences
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/029 Location-based management or tracking services
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/33 for indoor environments, e.g. buildings
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 64/00 Locating users or terminals or network equipment for network management purposes, e.g. mobility management

Abstract

A system and method for locating, tracking, and/or monitoring the status of personnel and/or assets (collectively “trackees”), both indoors and outdoors, is provided. Tracking data obtained from any number of sources utilizing any number of tracking methods (e.g., inertial navigation and signal-based methods) may be provided as input to a mapping application. The mapping application may generate position estimates for trackees using a suite of mapping tools to make corrections to the tracking data. The mapping application may further use information from building data, when available, to enhance position estimates. Indoor tracking methods including, for example, sensor fusion methods, map matching methods, and map building methods may be implemented to take tracking data from one or more trackees and compute a more accurate tracking estimate for each trackee. Outdoor tracking methods may be implemented to enhance outdoor tracking data by combining tracking estimates such as inertial tracks with magnetic and/or compass data if and when available, and with GPS, if and when available.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method for generating a position estimate of a trackee in an indoor location, comprising:

receiving tracking data for the trackee;

receiving a map of the indoor location;

correlating the tracking data to known features of the indoor location based on the received map to generate a position estimate for the trackee; and

displaying the generated position estimate on the map.