Apparatus for locating a mobile phone in a cellular phone system, in which the cellular phone system comprises plural base stations, each base station being associated with a cell, and in which the mobile phone is programmed to communicate signal strength of received signals to the base stations. Each base station, has a processing unit operably connected to the plural base stations by first communications links, the processing unit having as input the received signal strength measurements, the processing unit being programmed to operate upon the received signal strength measurements to solve a channel model equation in which the position of the mobile phone and the path loss exponent of the cell are unknowns and produce as output position location signals representing the position of the mobile phone in the cell, and a user interface operably connected to the processing unit by a second communication link for communicating signals indicative of the position of the mobile phone in the cell. Various algorithms may be used to solve the channel model equation. A method of locating a mobile phone by A) communicating signal strength measurements of signals received by the mobile phone to a processing unit; B) operating upon the signal strength measurements with the processing unit to solve a channel model equation in which the path loss exponent and the position of the mobile phone are unknowns.
https://patft.uspto.gov/
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on October 26, 2002.
https://www.ece.unb.ca/petersen/pubs/patents/trlabs2001/