Researchers are using a London Underground train to test whether quantum inertial navigation systems could be used to provide accurate location information for condition-based monitoring, train control and signalling applications without needing satellites or lineside equipment.
This forms part of a wider programme to develop an alternative to global navigation satellite systems which would be able to work underground, would not be degraded in the shadow of buildings and cannot be compromised by hostile action.
‘There has been lots of fundamental physics work over a decade’, Clive Roberts, Professor of Railway Systems Engineering at the University of Birmingham. told Metro Report International. He is the founder of the university’s spinout company MoniRail Ltd, which will lead the project.