The University of Southampton
University of Southampton Institutional Repository

Distributed cooperative positioning in mobile wireless networks: a GNN-aided joint modeland data-driven framework with high-accuracy closed-form message representation

Distributed cooperative positioning in mobile wireless networks: a GNN-aided joint modeland data-driven framework with high-accuracy closed-form message representation
Distributed cooperative positioning in mobile wireless networks: a GNN-aided joint modeland data-driven framework with high-accuracy closed-form message representation
Future mobile wireless networks will catalyze substantial demand for precise distributed cooperative positioning (DCP), especially when the global navigation satellite systems are unavailable. However, conventional message passing based DCP methods may suffer considerable performance degradation due to message approximation and sparsity/mobility of nodes. In this paper, we first present a high-accuracy parametric message approximation method, which achieves closed-form representations of all types of messages involved and reduces the computational complexity of message passing procedures. Using these representations, we propose a model- and datadriven hybrid inference approach, dubbed graph neural network enhanced spatio-temporal message passing (GNN-STMP), which fine-tunes parametric messages passed on factor graph and obtains more accurate a posteriori distribution of nodes’ positions by exploiting GNN-generated messages. Furthermore, we develop a universal framework for the parametric message passing based DCP problem, by integrating GNN-STMP with the extend Kalman filter based node’s state prediction and refinement. This framework significantly reduces the positioning ambiguity caused by insufficient spatial ranging measurements from neighbor nodes. Simulation results and analyses demonstrate that, compared with state-of-the-art methods, our proposed approaches achieve the best and near-best positioning accuracy when insufficient and sufficient spatial ranging measurements are available, respectively, while incurring modest computational complexity.
Distributed cooperative positioning, factor graph, graph neural network (GNN), mobile wireless networks, parametric message representation
1536-1276
6443-6457
Cao, Yue
12e59435-32de-4987-bfc8-827c350d5e2f
Yang, Shaoshi
23650ec4-bcc8-4a2c-b1e7-a30893f52e52
Feng, Zhiyong
bc023e8d-04ea-4a9a-b8a7-f67b432a4bce
Zhang, Ping
2def4374-679d-41d1-bf3a-483028a73275
Chen, Sheng
9310a111-f79a-48b8-98c7-383ca93cbb80
Cao, Yue
12e59435-32de-4987-bfc8-827c350d5e2f
Yang, Shaoshi
23650ec4-bcc8-4a2c-b1e7-a30893f52e52
Feng, Zhiyong
bc023e8d-04ea-4a9a-b8a7-f67b432a4bce
Zhang, Ping
2def4374-679d-41d1-bf3a-483028a73275
Chen, Sheng
9310a111-f79a-48b8-98c7-383ca93cbb80

Cao, Yue, Yang, Shaoshi, Feng, Zhiyong, Zhang, Ping and Chen, Sheng (2025) Distributed cooperative positioning in mobile wireless networks: a GNN-aided joint modeland data-driven framework with high-accuracy closed-form message representation. IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications, 24 (8), 6443-6457. (doi:10.1109/TWC.2025.3553136).

Record type: Article

Abstract

Future mobile wireless networks will catalyze substantial demand for precise distributed cooperative positioning (DCP), especially when the global navigation satellite systems are unavailable. However, conventional message passing based DCP methods may suffer considerable performance degradation due to message approximation and sparsity/mobility of nodes. In this paper, we first present a high-accuracy parametric message approximation method, which achieves closed-form representations of all types of messages involved and reduces the computational complexity of message passing procedures. Using these representations, we propose a model- and datadriven hybrid inference approach, dubbed graph neural network enhanced spatio-temporal message passing (GNN-STMP), which fine-tunes parametric messages passed on factor graph and obtains more accurate a posteriori distribution of nodes’ positions by exploiting GNN-generated messages. Furthermore, we develop a universal framework for the parametric message passing based DCP problem, by integrating GNN-STMP with the extend Kalman filter based node’s state prediction and refinement. This framework significantly reduces the positioning ambiguity caused by insufficient spatial ranging measurements from neighbor nodes. Simulation results and analyses demonstrate that, compared with state-of-the-art methods, our proposed approaches achieve the best and near-best positioning accuracy when insufficient and sufficient spatial ranging measurements are available, respectively, while incurring modest computational complexity.

Text
BUPT-TWCOMaccept - Accepted Manuscript
Download (3MB)
Text
TWCOM2025-Aug - Version of Record
Restricted to Repository staff only
Request a copy

More information

Accepted/In Press date: 3 March 2025
Published date: 13 August 2025
Keywords: Distributed cooperative positioning, factor graph, graph neural network (GNN), mobile wireless networks, parametric message representation

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 505412
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/505412
ISSN: 1536-1276
PURE UUID: 4a5e7129-71dd-469c-a192-c3f1cee4eb88

Catalogue record

Date deposited: 07 Oct 2025 17:18
Last modified: 07 Oct 2025 17:18

Export record

Altmetrics

Contributors

Author: Yue Cao
Author: Shaoshi Yang
Author: Zhiyong Feng
Author: Ping Zhang
Author: Sheng Chen

Download statistics

Downloads from ePrints over the past year. Other digital versions may also be available to download e.g. from the publisher's website.

View more statistics

Atom RSS 1.0 RSS 2.0

Contact ePrints Soton: eprints@soton.ac.uk

ePrints Soton supports OAI 2.0 with a base URL of http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/cgi/oai2

This repository has been built using EPrints software, developed at the University of Southampton, but available to everyone to use.

We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. If you continue without changing your settings, we will assume that you are happy to receive cookies on the University of Southampton website.

×