Transformation from ITRF2000 to WGS84

(Case Study: Iranian Permanent GPS Network, IPGN)

By: Azadeh Aghamohammadi

a.aghamohammadi@ncc.neda.net.ir
Hamid Reza Nankali
h-nankali@ncc.neda.net.ir
Yahya Djamour
y-djamour@ncc.neda.net.ir
National Cartographic Center of Iran
Meraj Av. Azadi Sq. Tehran Iran

Abstract:
This document provides a practical solution to the transformation of International
Terrestrial Reference Frame (ITRF2000) coordinates of Iranian permanent GPS Network
into WGS84 system.
WGS84 is geocentric coordinate datum most fit to geoid in Iran (30m) and is used as
a reference ellipsoid. IPGN coordinates are in ITRF2000. ITRF coordinates will in
general differ from WGS84coordinates, for two reasons, tectonic motions and reference
frame difference. Differences between the ITRF2000 coordinate reference frame and the
WGS84 are at the several cm in magnitude. A standard 7-parameter transformation can
adequately model these differences at the cm level. Two model have been tested, BursaWolf and Molodensky transformation models. Between these two, Bursa Wolf had the
better result and can be used as a better long-term practical solution to these coordinate
transformations.
Key Words: Transformation, ITRF, WGS84, IPGN, coordinates, GPS network
Introduction
Iran is situated in a region of collision between two major tectonic plates: Eurasian
and Arabian plates with the convergence rate 2.52mm (Vernant etal.2004). National
Cartographic Center of Iran started to build a GPS permanent network (IPGN) for crustal
deformation monitoring and estimating geo hazard in Iran. The data of this network
stations are in ITRF and closed to IGS stations, but all GPS stations in local and national
networks have coordinates in WGS84. NCC as a center, which is GPS data provider in
the country, has to support all users with precise and accurate GPS data. According to the
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difference between these two systems, estimating the transformation parameters seems to
be inevitable. It is necessary to introduce some keywords which ones should have general
view about them. These concepts are as follows:

IPGN (Iranian Permanent GPS Network)

IPGN is a dense and wide permanent GPS station network which established in
Iran (Tabriz-Tehran-Mashhad) and other active part of the country by National
Cartographic Center of Iran. Since first 2005 this network has been designed both for
crustal deformation monitoring and to serve as a highly precise geodetic network in Iran.
This network is consist if 106 permanent stations in first phase. Average distance
between dense parts is about 25 to 30km. GPS receivers are dual frequency from Ashtech
uz12 and scheduled to receive dual band carrier phase data and code data every 30
second in daily mode (24h). Master data center for controlling the network and data
analysis is settled in Tehran at National Cartographic Center of Iran. The data are
processed by precise analysis software called Gamit_Globk which is developed by MIT
and SIO. The results obtained by analysis are time series, group of coordinates, and time
series of relative position of two site, displacement vector and also velocity filed.

Figure 1: IPGN stations distribution

IGS (International GNSS Service)

A proof of concept for the International Global Positioning System (GPS) Service
for Geodynamics (IGS) was conducted with a three-month campaign during June through
September 1992, and continued until December 1993 as a Pilot-Service until the
establishment of the IGS as a service of the International Association of Geodesy (IAG).
The IGS formally began on 1 January 1994. IGS is a member of the Federation of
Astronomical and Geophysical Data Analysis Services (FAGS) and it operates in close
cooperation with the International Earth Rotation and Reference Systems Service (IERS).
Due to the expansion of IGS objectives, the name of the service was changed to
International GPS Service (IGS) on 1 January 1999. Following further expansion of IGS,
integrating data from the Russian GLONASS system and planning for the deployment of
the European Galileo system, the name was changed to "International Global Navigation
Satellite System (GNSS) Service" on 14 March 2005. The organization retains the
acronym "IGS".
The International GNSS Service is committed to providing the highest quality
data and products as the standard for Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) in
support of Earth science research, multidisciplinary applications, and education. These
activities endeavor to advance scientific understanding of the Earth system components
and their interactions, as well as to facilitate other applications benefiting society. The
Service also develops the necessary standards and specifications and encourages
international adherence to its conventions (http://igscb.jpl.nasa.gov).

Figure 2: IGS stations distribution

ITRF (International Terrestrial Reference Frame)

A Terrestrial Reference System (TRS) is a spatial reference system co-rotating
with the Earth in its diurnal motion in space. In such a system, positions of points

anchored on the Earth solid surface have coordinates which undergo only small variations
with time, due to geophysical point with precisely determined coordinates in specific
coordinate system (Cartesian, geographic, mapping..) attached to Terrestrial Reference
System (http://itrf.ensg.fr/trs_trf.pdp).
ITRF International Terrestrial Reference Frame is a set of physical point with
precisely determined coordinates attached to Terrestrial Reference System. In another
word, TFR is a physical materialization of TRS, making use of observations derived from
Space Geodesy techniques (Altamimi 2000).
ITRF2000combines unconstrained Space Geodesy solutions that are free from
any tectonic plate motion model. The ITRF2000 origin is define bye the Earth center of
mass sensed by Satellite Laser Ranging (SLR) and its scale by SLR and Very Long
Baseline Interferometry (VLBI). Its orientation is aligned to the ITRF97 at epoch 1997.0
and its orientation time evolution follows, conventionally, that of the NNR-NUVEL-1A
model. This frame containing about 800 stations located at about 500 sites, with better
distribution over the globe compared to past versions. About 50% of stations positions
are determined to better than 1 cm and about 100 sites have their velocity estimated to at
1 mm/y level (Altamimi 2000).

Figure 3: ITRF2000 map

WGS84 (World Geodetic System 1984)

The World Geodetic System defines a fixed global reference frame for the Earth, for
use in geodesy and navigation. The latest revision is WGS 84 dating from 1984 (last
revised in 2004), which will be valid up to about 2010. Earlier schemes included WGS
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72, WGS 64 and WGS 60. Efforts to supplement the various national surveying systems
began in the 19th century with F.R. Helmert's famous books Mathematische und
Physikalische Theorien der Physikalischen Geodsie. Austria and Germany initiated the
foundation of a Central Bureau of "Internationale Erdmessung", and a series of global
ellipsoids of the Earth were derived (e.g. Helmert 1906, Hayford 1910/ 1924).
In the late 1950s the United States DOD, together with scientists of other institutions
and countries, began to develop the needed world system to which geodetic datums could
be referred and compatibility established between the coordinates of widely separated
sites of interest. Efforts of the U.S. Army, Navy and Air Force were combined leading to
the DoD World Geodetic System 1960 (WGS 60).
In the early 1980s the need for a new world geodetic system was generally recognized
by the geodetic community, also within the Department of Defense. WGS 72 no longer
provided sufficient data, information, geographic coverage, or product accuracy for all
then current and anticipated applications. The means for producing a new WGS were
available in the form of improved data, increased data coverage, new data types and
improved techniques. GRS 80 parameters together with available Doppler, satellite laser
ranging and VLBI observations constituted significant new information. Also, an
outstanding new source of data had become available from satellite radar altimetry. Also
available was an advanced least squares method called collocation which allowed for a
consistent combination solution from different types of measurements all relative to the
Earth's gravity field, i.e. geoid, gravity anomalies, deflections, dynamic Doppler, etc.
The new World Geodetic System was called WGS 84. It is currently the reference
system being used by the Global Positioning System. It is geocentric and globally
consistent within 1 m. Current geodetic realizations of the geocentric reference system
family ITRS (International Terrestrial Reference System) maintained by the IERS are
geocentric, and internally consistent, at the few-cm level, while still being meter-level
consistent with WGS 84 (WGS- Wikipedia).

Figure 4: Gravimetric datum orientation

Data Processing
As it has been mentioned before, IPGN station coordinates are estimated in ITRF
whereas all the National GPS network coordinates are in WGS84. National Cartographic
Center of Iran as the main center of providing GPS data for users all over the country has
to support them with precise data. ITRF coordinates are in general differ from
WGS84coordinates, this difference are not more than 1 m in magnitude in Iran region.
Due to this difference, transferring the IPGN coordinates, by means of transformation
models, to the WGS84, for making them useable for different purposes in the country
seemed to be inevitable.
In this case, two transformation models were chosen and tested in order to find
best solution for this problem. The Molodensky-Badekas model and The Bursa-Wolf
transformation model which both are explained below.
The Bursa-Wolf transformation model:
The Bursa-Wolf (Bursa, 1962; Wolf, 1963) seven-parameter conformal model for
transforming three dimensional Cartesian co-ordinates between datums is especially
suited to satellite datums on a global scale (Krakiwsky and Thomson, 1974). This
comprises an origin shift from the geocenter in three-dimensional space (X0, Y0, Z0),
rotation of the vector position (rx, ry, rz), and a scale change (ds). These are applied in
matrix-vector form via

Y
Z

rz
ry X
X 0 1 + ds

rx Y
= Y0 + rz 1 + ds

rx 1 + ds Z I
W Z 0 ry

Where the subscripts W and I refer to the WGS84 and ITRF geodetic datums,
respectively. The single three by-three rotation matrix is simplified from three separate
rotation matrices by assuming that each axial rotation is differentially small (typically
less than five arc seconds for most geodetic networks), thus permitting binomial series
expansions of the sine and cosine terms for radian measure.

The Molodensky-Badekas model:

The Molodensky-Badekas model (Molodensky et al., 1962; Badekas, 1969) is also a
seven-parameter conformal transformation of three-dimensional Cartesian co-ordinates
between datums, but is more suited to the transformation between terrestrial and satellite
datums (Krakiwsky and Thomson, 1974). The Molodensky-Badekas model, as given by
Krakiwsky and Thomson (1974), Burford (1985) and Harvey (1986), is
X
X X m
Y = Y + Y +

m
Z W Z Z m

1 + ds
rz
ry X I X m

rx + YI Ym
rz 1 + ds
ry
rx 1 + ds Z I Z m

Where (X, Y, Z) are the shifts between the barycenter or centroid of the terrestrial
network (Xm, Ym, Zm) and the rotation matrix and scale change are theoretically identical
to the Bursa-Wolf model. Therefore, the only conceptual difference between the
Molodensky-Badekas and Bursa-Wolf models is the choice of the point about which the
axial rotations and scale change are applied. As this point is the barycentre for the
Molodensky-Badekas model, this model offers a more appropriate option for the
transformation between terrestrial and satellite datums. Theoretically, the Bursa-Wolf and
Molodensky-Badekas models should give the same results when the same data are used
to determine the respective sets of transformation parameters (Harvey, 1986).
However, due to better results, in this region, the Bursa-Wolf was used for
determination the transformation parameters.
Transformation
First step in this process was selecting some stations if IPGN of which WGS
coordinates were available and also have suitable distribution in Iran. These stations
should have been stable enough to trust. The two transformation models were tested on
these stations in order to find best transformation parameters. According to the results,
Bursa-Wolf was better.

Figure 5: selected stations in the first step

Figure 6: residuals of selected stations in the first step

Last part of the first stage was calculating the whole IPGN network coordinates in
WGS84 by the estimated parameters.
Estimated parameters in the first step by use of Bursa Wolf model:

Shift dX
Shift dY
Shift dZ
Rotation about X
Rotation about Y
Rotation about Z
Scale

0.551 0.0028
-0.373 0.0028
-0.817 0.0028
-0.001063 0.0013
0.009047 0.0016
-0.011414 0.0014
0.004874 0.0050

m
m
m
["]
["]
["]
[ppm]

Second step in this problem was selecting some other stations to control the
parameters precision.

0.01

0.008

0.006

0.004

X
Y
H

0.002

-0.002

-0.004

-0.006
ABRK

FARM

AKHT

HSGD

ARNG

Figure 7: residuals of selected stations in second step

Sample stations
ABRK

BAFT

FARM

FERD

GOLM

HSGD

NZSF

AKHT

ARNG

Coordinates in WGS84
3272488.8842
4378642.3891
3278126.8756
3068859.9114
4650639.0626
3098169.6382
2605739.8056
4484843.7788
3701674.3597
2790201.2364
4497164.5278
3549982.6017
2623242.6582
4408879.9754
3778806.4639
3269320.0083
4001011.6254
3729746.1263
3503262.0073
3517273.2330
3992909.3604
3296595.2229
4013422.1542
3691883.5187
3249698.5106
4023788.8735
3722852.4230

Transferred coordinate
3272488.8884
4378642.3918
3278126.8785
3068859.9149
4650639.0642
3098169.6402
2605739.8083
4484843.7802
3701674.3641
2790201.2401
4497164.5289
3549982.5998
2623242.6611
4408879.9746
3778806.4637
3269320.0045
4001011.6253
3729746.1263
3503262.0101
3517273.2326
3992909.3607
3296595.2129
4013422.1507
3691883.5128
3249698.5059
4023788.8745
4023788.8745

Table 1: selected stations in second step

residuals
-0.0042
-0.0027
-0.0029
-0.0035
-0.0017
-0.0020
-0.0027
-0.0015
-0.0045
-0.0037
-0.0010
0.0019
-0.0029
0.0008
0.0002
0.0037
0.0001
0.0000
-0.0028
0.0004
-0.0003
0.0099
0.0035
0.0058
0.0047
-0.0009
0.0018

Figure 8: residuals of all stations in X direction

Figure 9: residuals of all stations in Y direction

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Figure10: residuals of all stations in Z direction

Conclusion
As it is obvious in these charts the obtained parameters have acceptable results in
three dimensions with residuals better than 0.05 m in most stations in X and Y direction.
As far as can be seen in the Z direction chart, the magnitude of residuals are extremely
small and can say that it is ignorable. The last step done, was to compare 6 parameters
with 7 parameters model in order to see whether by omitting scale from 7-parameter, the
whole results will change or not. But no considerable difference was seen so in order to
keep standard form of parameters, 7 parameters presented as final transformation
parameters between ITRF2000 and WGS84 in Iran region.

Acknowledgements. This study was carried out with praiseworthy assistance of our
colleagues in IPGN Datacenter: Miss. A.Jdidi, Mrs. Z.Rahimi, Miss. Z.mousavi, Miss.
F.Korrami, Mrs. S.Hosseini, and Mr. K.Nazari

References and Related URLs

IPGN (Iranian Permanent GPS Network), Nankali, Jamour, Rahimi, GIM Sep 2006, v. 20, Issue 8
Establishment of permanent GPS network for crustal deformation monitoring in Iran, Jamour, Nankali, GIS
development 2006
Present-day crustal deformation and plate kinematics in the Middle East constrained by GPS measurements in Iran and
Northern Oman, Ph.Vernant Geophys. J. Int. 2004 157, 381-398
ITRF2000: A New Release of the International

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Terrestrial Reference Frame for Earth Science

Applications, Zuheir Altamimi, Patrick Sillard, Claude Boucher1
Institute Geographique National, Paris, France
Altamimi Z., C. Boucher and P. Sillard, New Trends for the Realization of the International Terrestrial Reference
System, Submitted to Adv. Space Res. , 2001.
Altamimi, Z., C. Boucher and L. Duhem, The Worldwide Centimetric Terrestrial Reference Frame and its Associ-ated
Velocity Field, Adv. Space Res. 13, (11)151-(11)160, 1993.
Boucher, C., Terrestrial coordinates systems and frames, in
Encyclopedia of Astronomy and Astrophysics, Mac Mil- lan, 2001.
W. E. Featherstone, A comparison of existing co-ordinate transformation
Models and parameters in Australia

Borkowski, K.M. (1989) Accurate algorithms to transform geocentric to geodetic co-ordinates, Bulletin
Godsique, vol. 63, pp. 50-56.
Badekas, J. (1969) Investigations related to the establishment of a world geodetic system, Report 124,
Department of Geodetic Science, Ohio State University, Columbus.
Molodensky et al., 1962; Badekas, 1969
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Satellite networks, The Canadian Surveyor, vol. 28, no. 5, pp. 606-615.
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Department of Geographic Information, The University of Queensland.
Harvey, B.R. (1986) Transformation of 3D co-ordinates. The Australian Surveyor, vol. 33, no. 2, pp.
105125.
"Its Definition and Relationships with Local geodetic Coordinate Systems",
DMA Technical Report 8350.2
Malys, S. and Slater, J. (1994) Maintenance and Enhancement of the World
Geodetic System 1984. Proceedings of ION GPS-94, Salt Lake City,
Utah. September 1994.
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GDA THE BASIS FOR BETTER SPATIAL
BUSINESS IN A REGIONAL SETTING, John Manning and Jim Steed
Australian Land Information Group Canberra, Australia,
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www.cddisa.gsfc.nasa.gov/cddis.html
www.hpiers.obspm.fr
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/WGS84
http://igscb.jpl.nasa.gov

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