Sensing RF environment to determine geographic location of cellular base station

A method of determining a geographic location of a small scale base station, the method comprising:

• querying, by the small scale base station, a serving mobile location center (SMLC) to determine a reference macro-base transceiver station (macro-BTS) and a neighbor macro-BTS of the reference macro-BTS;
• receiving a plurality of signals at the small scale base station including a first signal transmitted by the reference macro-BTS and a second signal transmitted by the neighbor macro-BTS;
• determining, by the small scale base station, a time of arrival, and corresponding assistance data, for each of the plurality of signals received at the small scale base station;
• and
• performing, by the small scale base station, location based calculations using the time of arrival, and/or corresponding assistance data, for each of the plurality of signals received at the small scale base station to determine the geographic location of the small scale base station.

A system for determining a geographic location of a small scale base station, the system comprising:

• a radio frequency receiver;
• and
• a processor configured to:
• query a serving mobile location center (SMLC) to determine a reference macro-base transceiver station (macro-BTS) and a neighbor macro-BTS of the reference macro-BTS;
• receive a plurality of signals including a first signal transmitted by the reference macro-BTS and a second signal transmitted by the neighbor macro-BTS;
• determine a time of arrival, and corresponding assistance data, for each of the plurality of received signals;
• and
• use the time of arrival, and corresponding assistance data, for each of the plurality of received signals to determine the geographic location of the small scale base station.

A system for determining a geographic location of a small scale base station, the system comprising:

• a communication interface;
• and
• a processor configured to:
• query a serving mobile location center (SMLC) to determine a reference macro-base transceiver station (macro-BTS) and a neighbor macro-BTS of the reference macro-BTS;
• receive a plurality of signals including a first signal transmitted by the reference macro-BTS and a second signal transmitted by the neighbor BTS;
• receive via the communication interface a set of measurement data that includes, for each of the plurality of received signals, a corresponding measurement data;
• and
• use the set of measurement data by performing location based calculations to determine the geographic location of the small scale base station.

A non-transitory computer program product for determining a geographic location of a small scale base station, the non-transitory computer program product being embodied in a memory and comprising computer instructions for:

• querying a serving mobile location center (SMLC) to determine a reference macro-base transceiver station (macro-BTS) and a neighbor macro-BTS of the reference macro-BTS;
• receiving a plurality of signals including a first signal transmitted by the reference macro-BTS and a second signal transmitted by the neighbor macro-BTS;
• receiving a set of measurement data that includes, each of the plurality of received signals, a corresponding measurement data;
• and
• performing location based calculations at the small scale base station using the set of measurement data to determine the geographic location of the small scale base station.

A method of determining a geographic location of a small scale base station, the method comprising:

• determining, by a serving mobile location center (SMLC), a reference location measurement unit (LMU) and a neighbor LMU of the reference LMU;
• receiving, at the SMLC, a first set of measurement data from the reference LMU and second set of measurement data from the neighbor LMU,
• wherein the first set of measurement data corresponds to a plurality of uplink transmissions received at the reference LMU, from the small scale base station, and the second set of measurement data corresponds to a plurality of uplink transmissions received at the neighbor LMU, from the small scale base;
• determining, by the SMLC, a third set of measurement data corresponding to a difference between the first set of measurement data and the second set of measurement data;
• and
• performing location based calculations at the SMLC using the third set of measurement data to determine the geographic location of the small scale base station.