Analysis of the Realistic Resolution with Angle of Arrival for Indoor Positioning

The increasing importance of localizing objects in indoor environments is the motivation for much research on localization algorithms. This paper focuses on the maximum achievable resolution for Angle of Arrival as a means to position objects inside rooms using equipment within the field of wireless sensor networks, thus dealing with restricted resources. A clear view on beamforming using antenna arrays is represented and is proven to be useful in Angle of Arrival measurements. A detailed overview of a dedicated algorithm, leads the authors to draw conclusions concerning the resolution. A reference value is defined, which allows the authors to calculate the realistic resolution for all room dimensions. In order to verify these theoretical outcomes with practical results, the development of a quadrature demodulation based antenna array architecture, operating at 2.4 GHz, is presented. The latter is based on a study of different phase shifting technologies.