NUCLEAR SCINTILLATION EFFECTS ON RF PROPAGATION AT SHF/EHF FREQUENCIES

THE OBJECTIVES OF THE PROPOSED EFFORT ARE TO PROVIDE NUCLEAR SCINTILLATION SIGNAL DESCRIPTIONS FOR SATELLITE TO GROUND COMMUNICATIONS LINKS OPERATING IN THE SHF/EHF FREQUENCY BAND AND TO RESOLVE DIFFERENCES IN EXISTING SCINTILLATION STUDIES. THE SIGNAL DESCRIPTIONS WILL INCLUDE THE SPATIAL AND TEMPORAL VARIATIONS OF THE SIGNAL PARAMETERS AND MATHEMATICAL DESCRIPTIONS OF THE FIRST AND SECOND ORDER STATISTICS OF THE SCINTILLATION. IN THE PROCESS OF PROVIDING THE SIGNAL DESCRIPTIONS, UNCERTAINTIES IN THE NUCLEAR PHENOMENOLOGY AND PROPAGATION CALCULATIONS THAT IMPACT THE SPECIFIC APPLICATION WILL BE IDENTIFIED AS TASK FOR FUTURE RESEARCH. THE PROPOSED APPROACH IS TO USE THE DEFENSE NUCLEAR AGENCY'S SIGNAL SPECIFICATION FOR NUCLEAR SCINTILLATION TO DEVELOP SYSTEM DESIGN REQUIREMENTS. SYSTEM SPECIFIC EFFECTS SUCH AS PROPAGATION PATH GEOMETRY AND ANTENNA EFFECTS, IF ANY, WILL BE INCLUDED IN THE DESIGN REQUIREMENTS. DIFFERENCES IN SCINTILLATION STUDIES WILL BE RESOLVED BY APPLYING THE RESULTS OF DETAILED NUCLEAR ENVIROMENT AND PROPAGATION SIMULATIONS AND EXPERIMENTS.