The Location Measurement Unit (LMU): An Application of Embedded Systems in Mobile Location Estimation

Abstract

Embedded systems are commonly available in many electronic devices where they add special functionalities, features and high levels of efficiency to the general operation of these devices. Embedded systems consist of hardware, software, and an environment. The hardware comprises mainly the processing cores that are typically either microcontrollers or digital signal processors (DSP). The key characteristic of these systems, however, is being dedicated to handle a particular task. Since the embedded system is dedicated to specific tasks, design engineers can optimize it to reduce the size and cost of the product and increase the reliability and performance. This paper takes a deep look into the procedures for the design of embedded systems and the fields of application of these systems, with a special emphasis on a mobile network entity called the Location Measurement Unit (LMU) which is used for location measurements in 3G wireless networks.