Method of generating direction vector of particle, and apparatus and method for estimating indoor location based thereon

1 . An apparatus for estimating an indoor location in a wireless communication environment, the apparatus comprising:

an interface unit configured to receive a positioning infrastructure measurement value from a terminal and a radio map database (DB) which is referred to by one or more particles in a cluster including the particles; and

a processor configured to:

set a service area in which the particles form the cluster;

initialize the particles within the service area;

calculate characteristic values of the particles on the basis of the positioning infrastructure measurement values including wireless signal strength information from the terminal and the radio map DB which is referred to by the particles;

calculate a center of gravity of the particles using the characteristic values;

calculate direction vectors of the particles on the basis of the center of gravity;

perform resampling on the particles according to the direction vector of each particle to reduce convergence time of particle distribution toward a location of the terminal; and

estimate an indoor location of the terminal based on a result of the resampling on the particles according to the direction vector of each particle.

2 . The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the characteristic values include similarities between the positioning infrastructure measurement values and the radio map DB which is referred to by the particles.

3 . The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the processor determines moving directions of the particles according to the direction vectors of the particles when the particles are moved or divided.

4 . The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the processor determines moving distances of the particles according to a magnitude of a displacement of movement in which the particles are moved or divided.

5 . A method of estimating an indoor location in a wireless communication environment, the method comprising:

receiving, by an interface unit, positioning infrastructure measurement values from a terminal and a radio map database (DB) which is referred to by a plurality of particles in a cluster including the particles;

setting a service area in which the particles form the cluster;

initializing the particles within the service area;

calculating, by a processor, characteristic values of the particles on the basis of the positioning infrastructure measurement values including wireless signal strength information from the terminal and the radio map DB which is referred to by the particles, calculating a center of gravity of the particles using the characteristic values, and calculating direction vectors of the particles on the basis of the center of gravity;

performing resampling on the particles according to the direction vector of each particle to reduce convergence time of particle distribution toward a location of the terminal; and

estimating, by the processor, an indoor location of the terminal based on a result of the resampling on the particles according to the direction vector of each particle.

6 . The method of claim 5 , wherein the characteristic values include similarities between the positioning infrastructure measurement values and the radio map DB which is referred to by the particles.

7 . The method of claim 5 , wherein, in the estimating of the indoor location of the terminal, the processor determines moving directions of the particles according to the direction vectors of the particles when the particles are moved or divided.

8 . The method of claim 5 , wherein, in the estimating of the indoor location of the terminal, the processor determines moving distances of the particles according to a magnitude of a displacement of movement in which the particles are moved or divided.

9 . A method of generating direction vectors of particles in a wireless communication environment, the method comprising:

receiving information on the particles corresponding to a radio map database (DB);

setting a service area in which the particles form a cluster;

initializing the particles within the service area;

calculating, by a processor, a center of gravity of the particles on the basis of characteristic values of one or more particles in the cluster including the particles;

generating, by the processor, direction vectors of the particles on the basis of the center of gravity; and

performing resampling on the particles according to the direction vector of each particle to reduce convergence time of particle distribution toward a location of the terminal.

10 . The method of claim 9 , wherein the characteristic values include similarities between positioning infrastructure measurement values and a radio map database (DB) which is referred to by the particles.

11 . The method of claim 10 , wherein, in the calculating of the center of gravity of the particles, the processor calculates the center of gravity by performing a weighted sum on the similarities.

12 . The method of claim 10 , wherein, in the generating of the direction vectors of the particles, the processor calculates the direction vectors on the basis of directions of the particles with respect to the center of gravity.

13 . The method of claim 10 , wherein, in the generating of the direction vectors of the particles, the processor obtains the direction vectors of the particles by summing the direction vectors of the particles and direction vectors calculated from at least one cluster.

14 . The method of claim 10 , further comprising, in the generating of the direction vectors of the particles, calculating, by the processor, a magnitude of a displacement to which the particle should be moved using a maximum value of the similarities of the particles in the cluster and using the similarities of the particles.

15 . The method of claim 9 , wherein, in the generating of the direction vectors of the particles, when the particle has a plurality of direction vectors, the processor sums the plurality of direction vectors.