Integrated SW for LEO Satellites End-To-End Performance

One of the objectives of the “Advanced Techniques for High Data Rate Links for Earth Exploration Satellites" study, ESA Contract n. 22455/09/NL/JK, is the development of a set of SW to allow the system designer computing the end-to-end performance of a transmission system in a LEO orbit using Variable Coding modulation (VCM) techniques. Under the assumption of an ideal transmission system not including non-linear effects, the SW allow customizing the main mission parameters according to a user defined scenario; the atmospheric contribution in terms of both attenuation, sky temperature throughout the whole ground station contact is computed, enabling a complete “statistical” knowledge of the Es/No curve and consequently an optimized VCM technique. In particular, the VCM technique described in this paper was improved with respect to first results obtained by TAS-I and already presented in [1]. [1] M. Cossu et al “VCM techniques for Ka-Band LEO satellites”, 15th Ka and Broadband Communications, Navigation and Earth Observation Conference, September 2009 – Cagliari