SYSTEMS AND METHODS TO DETERMINE A LOCATION OF A MOBILE DEVICE

• US 20170013409A1
• Filed: 06/27/2016
• Published: 01/12/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 07/09/2015
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Onemarket Network LLC
• Original Assignee: Westfield Labs Corporation
• Inventors: Cerchio, Gerard Joseph, Wilson, Brian David
• Granted Patent: US 10,206,068 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/206 specially adapted for indoor navigation
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 25/005 initial alignment, calibration or starting-up of inertial devices
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 5/013 Identifying areas in a building
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 5/014 Identifying transitions between environments
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 5/02521 using a radio-map
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 5/0257 Hybrid positioning by coordinating position lines of different shape G01S5/12
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 5/0264 at least one of the systems being a non-radio wave positioning system
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/025 using location based information parameters
• 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 72/0473 the resource being transmission power

Abstract

Systems and methods to position beacons at traffic choke points, use a mobile device to detect the peaks of beacon signals corresponding to the mobile device traveling through the traffic “choke points”, and thus determine accurately the position and speed of the mobile device in the transport corridor between the choke points. The determined position and speed of the mobile device can be used to improve the performance of other location determination technologies, such as radio frequency fingerprint-based location estimate and/or inertial guidance location estimate.

Claims

1. A method, comprising:

providing a first beacon device at a first location of a transport corridor in a multi-floor environment;

providing a second beacon device at a second location of the transport corridor;

determining a mobile device being at the first location at a first time instance based on a peak of beacon signal power from the first beacon device;

determining the mobile device being the second location at a second time instance based on a peak of beacon signal power from the second beacon device;

correlating movement of the mobile device from the first location to the second location with a predetermined traffic speed along the corridor; and

determining a position and a speed of the mobile device at a time instance based on the movement of the mobile device from the first location to the second location along the corridor.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

calibrating, based on the position and the speed of the mobile device, an initial position and an initial speed used in an initial guidance system of the mobile device.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the mobile device includes motion sensors to measure acceleration and rotation of the mobile device to track a current location of the mobile device from the initial position and the initial speed.

4. The method of claim 2, wherein the position and the speed of the mobile device determined from the movement of the mobile device in the corridor are used as the initial position and the initial speed.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

improving, based on the position of the mobile device, a position determination result from a radio frequency fingerprint-based location determination system of the mobile device.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the mobile device includes a transceiver configured to measure a radio frequency fingerprint and determines a location of the mobile device based on correlation the radio frequency fingerprint with a predetermined distribution of radio frequency fingerprints in the multi-floor environment.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the position of the mobile device determined from the movement of the mobile device in the corridor is used to select a floor from a plurality of floors in the multi-floor environment.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the transport corridor includes one of:

a stairway, an escalator, an elevator, an entrance, and an exit.

9. A non-transitory computer storage medium storing instructions configured to instruct a computing apparatus to perform a method, the method comprising:

measuring, by a mobile device, a radio frequency fingerprint;

correlating the radio frequency fingerprint to a predetermined distribution of radio frequency fingerprints in a multi-floor environment;

determining a first location determination result based on the correlating;

measuring, by the mobile device, accelerations of the mobile device as a function of time;

determining a second location determination result based on the accelerations;

receiving, in the mobile device, a first beacon signal from a beacon device disposed at a first location of a transport corridor in the multi-floor environment;

determining a first location of the beacon device based on the first beacon signal; and

computing a location of the mobile device based on the first location of the beacon device, the first location determination result, and the second location determination result.

10. The medium of claim 9, wherein the method further comprises:

receiving, in the mobile device, a second beacon signal from the beacon device; and

determining a second location of the beacon device based on the second beacon signal;

wherein the computing of the location of the mobile device is further based on the second location of the beacon device.

11. The medium of claim 10, wherein the method further comprises:

determining a speed of the mobile device based on the first location and the second location of the beacon device;

wherein the second location determination result is determined based at least in part on the speed of the mobile device.

12. The medium of claim 11, wherein the transport corridor is one of:

an escalator and an elevator.

13. The medium of claim 12, wherein the first beacon signal identifies the first location of the beacon device;

and the second beacon signal identifies the second location of the beacon device.

14. The medium of claim 13, wherein the first location of the beacon device is used to select a floor in the first location determination result.

15. The medium of claim 10, wherein the method further comprises:

receiving, in the mobile device, a second beacon signal from a second beacon device;

determining a second location of the second beacon device based on the second beacon signal;

determining a speed of the mobile device based on the first location and the second location;

wherein the second location determination result is determined based at least in part on the speed of the mobile device.

16. A mobile device, comprising:

a motion sensor;

at least one transceiver;

at least one microprocessor; and

a memory storing instructions configured to instruct the at least one microprocessor and the at least one transceiver to;

measure, using the at least one transceiver, a radio frequency fingerprint;

determine a first location determination result based on correlating the radio frequency fingerprint to a predetermined distribution of radio frequency fingerprints in a multi-floor environment;

measure, using the motion sensor, accelerations of the mobile device as a function of time;

determine a second location determination result based on the accelerations; and

compute a location of the mobile device by combining the first location determination result and the second location determination result.

17. The mobile device of claim 16, wherein the instructions are further configured to instruct the at least one microprocessor to:

estimate an accuracy of the first location result; and

estimate an accuracy of the second location result;

wherein the combining of the first location determination result and the second location determination result is based on the accuracy of the first location result and the accuracy of the second location result.

18. The mobile device of claim 17, wherein the combining of the first location determination result and the second location determination result is based on a weighted average of the first location determination result and the second location determination result where weights of first location determination result and the second location determination result are based on the accuracy of the first location result and the accuracy of the second location result.

19. The mobile device of claim 18, wherein the instructions are further configured to instruct the at least one microprocessor to:

receive at least two beacon signals from at least one beacon device disposed on a transport corridor in a multi-floor environment;

determine at least two beacon positions corresponding to the at least two beacon signals; and

estimate of a position and a speed of the mobile device on the transport corridor based on the at least two beacon positions;

wherein the location of the mobile device is computed based at least in part on the position and the speed of the mobile device on the transport corridor estimated based on the at least two beacon positions.

20. The mobile device of claim 19, wherein the second location determination result is based on the accelerations, and the position and the speed of the mobile device on the transport corridor estimated based on the at least two beacon positions;

and a floor in the first location determination result is determined based on the position the mobile device on the transport corridor estimated based on the at least two beacon positions.