In recent years wireless propagation channel research has paid considerable attention to dense multipath, which is an indispensable part of propagation channels and may significantly contribute to the received power in variety of environments and frequency bands. Mathematical representation of dense multipath is different from that of specular components (SCs) due to its distinct propagation mechanism and impact on system performance. Therefore, accurate understanding and modeling of dense multipath together with SCs are important for parametric channel estimation and for reliable simulation in wireless applications. This paper first presents a systematic survey of studies of dense multipath in terms of different representations, channel modeling approaches and estimation methods. Thereafter, a comprehensive review of the characteristics and impact of dense multipath on performance of communication, localization and sensing systems is provided. Finally, open research topics are discussed.

Real-time, accurate, and robust positioning system plays a crucial role in many vehicular applications for automatic driving system and Vehicular Ad-hoc Network (VANET). In the tunnel, the positioning accuracy of Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) decreases due to blocked satellite signals. In order to estimate the exact location of vehicles in tunnel environments, many positioning systems have been presented. However, there is a lack of effort in systematically comparing, organizing and analyzing these existing positioning systems, and identifying the strengths and weaknesses of different technologies and applicable scenarios. Therefore, this paper undertakes a thorough investigation into current vehicle localization technologies and methods for tunnel scenarios. The analysis starts with discussing various application scenarios for vehicle positioning system. Then, various vehicle positioning technologies are investigated, the advantages and drawbacks of each technology are illustrated. Thereafter, we discuss some widely used positioning methods in terms of range-based localization method, range-free localization method, multi-sensor fusion localization method, and cooperative positioning (CP) method. Finally, we discuss some challenges faced in vehicle positioning for tunnel environments, and propose some potential research topics for future research work.

To design and evaluate vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communication systems in intelligent transportation system (ITS), it is important to understand the propagation mechanisms and channel models of V2V channels. This paper aims to analyze the channel models at 5.2 GHz for the highway environment in obstructed line-of-sight (OLoS) and line-of-sight (LoS) scenarios, particularly the vehicle connectivity probability derivation based on the propagation model obtained from measurement. First, the path loss (PL), shadow fading (SF), narrowband K-factor, and small-scale amplitude fading are analyzed. Results showed that the received signal magnitude follows Rice and Weibull distribution in LoS and OLoS scenarios, respectively. Second, we develop simple and low-complexity tapped delay line (TDL) models with a 10 MHz bandwidth for LoS and OLoS scenarios; in addition, we investigate the wideband K-factor, the root mean square delay spread (RMS-DS), and delay-Doppler spectrum. Third, we derive the closed form connectivity probability between any two vehicles in the presence of Weibull fading channel, and analyze the effects of Weibull fading channel and traffic parameters on connectivity. It is found that Weibull fading parameter, transmit power and vehicle density have positive impact on connectivity probability, PL exponent has negative impact on connectivity probability.

Range-based positioning using wireless signal has gained remarkable attention in past decades. Accurately extracting the distance information, i.e., estimating parameters of individual multipath, is of interest. It has been shown that diffuse multipath component (DMC) in wireless propagation channel has significant influence on channel estimation and, thus, the ranging performance. In addition to specular component (SC), DMC should be considered in order to improve the estimated accuracy of channel paths’ parameters and, thus, the ranging performance. In this paper, we extend the quasi-maximum likelihood space-alternating generalized expectation-maximization (SAGE) algorithm by incorporating an autoregressive moving average (ARMA) filter to estimate the channel parameters under the presence of DMC. The parameters of both DMC and SC are estimated in an iterative approach, where the DMC is assumed as colored noise and the ARMA-filter is used to estimate the contributions from DMC. The validation of the algorithm based on measured data shows that both SC and DMC can be accurately estimated by the proposed approach. A comparison with standard SAGE and AR-SAGE is conducted, where the results reveal that the proposed method outperforms other two approaches in terms of ranging accuracy.

Due to the satellite signals are blocked, it is difficult to obtain the vehicle position in the tunnels. We propose a single-site vehicle localization scheme for the rectangular tunnel environment, where most satellite-based positioning methods can not provide the required localization accuracy. In the non-line-of-sight (NLOS) scenarios, we make use of the reflection paths as assistants for vehicle positioning. Specifically, first, the virtual stations are established based on the actual geometrical structure of the tunnel. Second, we use the direction-of-arrival (DOA) and time-of-arrival (TOA) information of reflection paths from two tunnel walls to achieve vehicle positioning. Especially, the Cramer-Rao lower bound (CRLB) of the joint TOA and DOA localization for NLOS propagations in a two-dimensional (2D) space is derived. In addition, based on the localization algorithms with and without filters, we assess the localization performance. In the line-of-sight (LOS) scenarios, we use the LOS path and two reflection paths from the tunnel walls to estimate the vehicle location. First, virtual base stations are established. Second, based on the obtained TOA information, different positioning algorithms are used to estimate the vehicle location. Simulation results illustrate that the proposed positioning approach can provide a small root mean square error. The localization algorithms using filters improve the localization accuracy, compared with the positioning algorithm without using filters, namely, the two-stage weighted least squares (TSWLS) algorithm. Moreover, the Unscented Particle Filter (UPF) algorithm achieves better positioning accuracy than other methods (i.e., Unscented Kalman Filter (UKF), Extended Kalman Filter (EKF), TSWLS algorithms).

Vehicular ad hoc network (VANET) brings an excellent solution to ensure road safety and transportation efficiency in critical environment like tunnel. Particularly, radio link connectivity of vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) significantly influences the performance of VANETs. The communication range of the radio systems is a random variable in reality due to the channel fading effect. Therefore, the connectivity model between vehicles in realistic environment is a key for accurate evaluation of system performances. In this paper, we study the V2V connectivity performance in the presence of channel randomness for tunnel environment. Firstly, based on channel measurement campaign, empirical path loss (PL) and small-scale fading channel models are established. Secondly, we study the influence of large-scale fading parameters on V2V connectivity. Thirdly, based on real small-scale fading characteristics, we derive the V2V connectivity probability between any two vehicles under Nakagami fading channel for one-dimensional VANET, and give the closed-form of V2V connectivity probability. Finally, we study the influences of various parameters (i.e., Nakagami fading factor, vehicle density, and neighbor order) on V2V connectivity performance. Results show that with the Nakagami fading shape factor increases, the connectivity probability increases. The shadowing fading can improve connectivity in the VANET; the path loss exponent, transmission distance, and signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) threshold have a negative impact on connectivity probability. The transmit power, vehicle density, and path loss threshold value have a positive impact on connectivity.