Typical Ka band Satellite Beacon Receiver Design for Propagation Experimentation

Abstract

This paper presents the design and simulation of a typical Ka band satellite beacon receiver for propagation experimentation. Using satellite beacon signal as a reference signal in satellite wave propagation study, is one of the most important methods. Satellite beacons are frequently available for pointing large antennas, but such signals can be used for measuring the effect of natural phenomena such as atmospheric gases, water vapor, oxygen molecules, clouds, rain, dust and fog existing in different layers of the atmosphere, including troposphere and ionosphere.In recent years, different designs of satellite beacon receiver (analog and digital) are proposed and implemented. Beacon signals are used for various applications including precise orientation of the earth station to the satellite, automatic frequency control and satellite propagation research. These cases demonstrate the importance of using the reference beacon signal. To receive satellite beacon, an appropriate receiver is needed. Locking on satellite beacon signal is hard. Though conventional satellite receivers are also generally able to track the beacon signal, the nature of the signal is led to create a special receiver. In this paper, the design and simulation of a satellite signal beacon receiver have been done in Ka band.

Keywords

• Beacon signal
• Satellite beacon receiver
• Satellite communications
• Satellite wave propagation