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‘It’s the perfect place’: London Underground hosts tests for ‘quantum compass’ that could replace GPS (www.theguardian.com)

submitted 10 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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[–] [email protected] 27 points 10 months ago (1 children)

It will definitely require corrections from GPS or other systems, but if made sufficiently accurate; it could be months or even years before the accumulated errors necessitate a correction.

What seems more concerning to me is a system like this would require 100% up time between outside corrections.

A gps receiver can acquire its position from a completely powered off state. Inertial guidence though, needs to be told its current position; then it can keep track of where it goes from there. If there's any hiccup with power, you've completely lost your location fix and can't reacquire it alone.

Put the two together though, and the inertial guidence can accurately fill in the gaps between gps service while also getting regular updates/corrections when you do have that signal available.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 10 months ago

I don't think you'll ever see an INS going months without needing a correction. Imperfect gravitational compensation applies directly to the specific force measurements and those errors are then accumulated twice.