GNSS Ambiguity Bootstrapping: Theory and Application

The purpose of carrier phase ambiguity resolution is to improve upon the precision of the estimated GNSS baseline by means of the integer ambiguity constraints. There exists a whole class of integer ambiguity estimators from which one can choose. Members from this class are, for instance, integer rounding, integer bootstrapping and integer leastsquares. In this review paper we will present the theory and application of the method of integer bootstrapping. Particular emphasis is given to the probabilistic properties of the bootstrapped estimator. We will present the probability mass function of the bootstrapped estimator, the bootstrapped pull-in regions, the distribution of the bootstrapped baseline and easy-to-compute ways of evaluating the confidence regions of the GNSS baselines. They are important if one wants to perform a rigorous quality control.