Length: 4 Days
Satellite Communications Training for non-engineers
Satellites are relay stations in space for the transmission of voice, video and data communications.
They are ideally suited to meet the global communications requirements of military, government and commercial organizations because they provide economical, scalable and highly reliable transmission services that easily reach multiple sites over vast geographic areas.
Transmissions via satellite communications systems can bypass the existing ground-based infrastructure, which is often limited and unreliable in many parts of the world.
Satellite communications involves four steps:
- An uplink Earth station or other ground equipment transmits the desired signal to the satellite
- The satellite amplifies the incoming signal and changes the frequency
- The satellite transmits the signal back to Earth
- The ground equipment receives the signal
The next era of satellite communications is upon us in the form of low-earth-orbit constellations aiming to revolutionize personal connectivity.
At least that’s what the satellite experts say. These new satellite swarms are being driven by technology innovations simultaneously with the growth of less-expensive launch services. This is expected to result in a mushrooming explosion in the number and type of orbiters serving their earthbound hosts while raising the bar for support technologies on the ground.
Consequently, given the overall satellite communications (SATCOM) field becoming more dynamic, companies are compelled to be more flexible as uncertainties increase. Some, you could say, are hedging their bets and exploring the use of orbiters that can be replaced or upgraded relatively easily, as opposed to complex and expensive platforms that last many years but take just as long to design and, if necessary, replace.
What’s happening as a result is a spurt in the number of low-earth-orbit satellites that introduce new capabilities for SATCOM services. Their constellations in turn will spawn innovative technologies that can be applied both on orbit and on the ground.
It’s expected that both the military and the private sector soon will have at their disposal large constellations of communications satellites offering a variety of capabilities.
Satellite Communications Training for non-engineers Course by Tonex
This course is designed to provide a general technical overview of Satellite Communications and GMR-1 family of technologies for non-technical professionals including sales, marketing, product managers, finance, project and program managers, and executive management. Course Objectives
- General understanding satellite communications theory at a technician level
- General understanding of GMR-1
- Compare satellite, wireless, wired, and fiber communications and their preferred applications
- Describe spacecraft physical size, payloads, transponders, antennas, lifetime
- Describe typical launch vehicles; Compare LEO, MEO, and GEO orbits
- List the frequencies bands used for satellite communications
- Describe the concepts of links, link budgets, and how they are affected by dish size
- Define qualitatively EIRP, G/T, footprints, and contours
- Describe the main properties of microwaves and how signals are affected by blockage
- Define rain fade loss, rain zones, availability
- Explain solar outages
- Describe the high-level operation of a satellite transponder
- Compare the main types of antennas used for earth stations
- Define amplitude, frequency, decibels, gain, EIRP, spectrum, symbol rate, bandwidth, noise, power, C/N, and Eb/No
- Define modulation and demodulation
- Describe and compare BPSK, QPSK, and 8PSK
- Define and describe SCPC, TDM, TDMA, MF-TDMA, DVB, DVB-RCS, star, and mesh networks
- Describe the functions of a LAN, Ethernet, IP address, subnet, gateway/router address, DNS, DHCP, NAT
Session overview / plans and delivery methods
- Pre-Assessment
- Lectures
- Case Studies
- Post-Assessments
Course Outline Satellite Communications Overview
- Common types of satellites
- Comparing satellites
- Orbits
- Orbit types: GEO, LEO, MEO, HEO
- Space Segment
- Laws of satellite motion
- Basic Components
- Spacecraft, transponders, and launch vehicles
- Transmitters
- Transponder
- Antennas
- Power Generation
- Payload
- Propulsion
- Launch vehicles
- Spectrum
- Bands
- Channels
- Carriers
- Channelization
- Satellite Access Techniques
Technical Overview of Common Satellite communications Terminology
- EIRP, G/T, contours, and their relationships to dish size
- Gains, losses, and levels
- Fundamentals of dB and level calculations
- Signals, noise and spectrums
- Antennas, including side lobes, patterns and gain
- Propagation, including rain fade, blockage, snow/ice effects
- Satellite links, with breakdown of link budget concepts, link margins, and availability.
- Polarization
- Earth station and other equipment
- Multiple Access Techniques
- Access methods
- SCPC, TDMA, TDM, DAMA, CDMA, OFDM, DVB
- Single channel per carrier (SCPC)
- Propagation Interference and Regulation
- Payload Engineering
- Spacecraft Engineering and Operations
- Earth Station Engineering
- Modems
- Modulation and coding
- Amplitude modulation
- Frequency modulation
- Phase modulation
- Chanel coding and decoding
- Footprints
- Link budget
- Link margin
- Payload
- Gateway
- NOC
- SOC
- Horizontal and geographic satellite coordinates and look angles
- Trajectories
Basic Overview of GMR-1
- GMR-1: The basic circuit switched model
- GmPRS: Adding support for packet data
- Mobile broadband and internet protocols
- Overview of SGSN, GGSN
- Basic concepts behind Ethernet, IP address, subnet, gateway/router address, DNS, DHCP, and NAT
- GMR-1 3G
- 3G Definitions by ITU-T and IMT-2000
- Overview of CDMA, WCDMA and UMTS
- GEO-Mobile Radio Interface
- Terminal-to-Terminal Call (TtT)
Basic Transmission Principles
- Satellite architecture and subsystems
- Baseband signals
- Analog transmission
- Digital transmission
- Key parameters: EIRP G/T, SFD, Input/Output
- Backoff, C/No, Eb/No
- Typical link budget, link margin and availability
- Modulation systems (QPSK, OQPSK, MSK, 8PSK, and 16 QAM)
- Basic aperture antenna definitions and relationships
- Typical antenna configurations for satellite communications
- Propagation and Interference
- Radio noise
- Interference between satellite networks
- Interference with terrestrial networks
Network Architectures
- Traffic multiplexing
- Multiple access, and assignments strategies
- Satellite Engineering for Communications Satellites
Properties of Bands
- Availability
- Current and projected Applications
- UT/Terminal
- Design process and suitability for manufacturing
- Manufacturing process
- Next generation technologies
- Platforms for Terminal (Chips, OS, MMI, etc.)
- Transmission (coding, modulations, etc.)
Ground Segment
- Types of earth stations
- Architecture of earth station
- Design considerations
- Earth station hardware
- Antennas
RF Principals
- IF and Baseband equipment
- Terrestrial interface
- Satellite tracking
- Antennas
Overview of GSM, GPRS, EDGE, UMTS and LTE Technologies
- Different components of a GSM system and what each does
- SIM
- BTS
- BSC
- MSC
- HLR
- VLR
- EIR
- SMSC
- GGSN
- SGSN
- UMTS and LTE Architecture
- W-CDMA, OFDMA/SC-FDMA and MIMO
User terminals
- General UT design – different subsystems and components
- Types of antennas and design
- Capabilities and limitations
- Product development process
Satellite Link Design Fundamentals
- Transmission equation
- Satellite link parameters
- Frequency considerations
- Propagation considerations
- Techniques to counter propagation effects
- Noise considerations
- Interference related problems
- Link design – procedure and link budget
Satellite Communications Training for non-engineers