Analysis, Mitigation, and Testing Capability for Antenna Tracking in Disturbed Propagation Environments

ANTENNA TRACKING SYSTEMS FOR SATELLITE COMMUNICATIONS LINKS ARE SUBJECT TO PERFORMANCE DEGRADATION IN THE PRESENCE OF SIGNAL PROPAGATION DISTURBANCES. THE EXTENT OF THIS DEGRADATION AND THE CORRESPONDING SENSITIVITY TO TRACKING SYSTEM CONFIGURATIONS AND DESIGN PARAMETERS HAS NOT BEEN QUANTIFIED. SYSTEM SPECIFICATIONS AND RECEIVER DESIGNS DEVELOPED IN THE ABSENCE OF THIS INFORMATION MAY RESULT IN UNEXPECTED AND UNDESIRABLE REDUCTION OR LOSS OF COMMUNICATION PERFORMANCE. FURTHERMORE, MITIGATED ANTENNA TRACKING ANALYSIS, DESIGN, AND VERIFICATION ARE NOT STRAIGHTFORWARD MATTERS. PRESENTLY THERE ARE NO TOOLS AVAILABLE TO ADEQUATELY ASSESS THE POTENTIAL DEGRADATION LEVELS AND VALIDATE MITIGATION DESIGNS FOR OPERATION IN THE PRESENCE OF PROPAGATION DISTURBANCES. THE OBJECTIVE OF THIS EFFORT WILL BE TO DEVELOP THE CAPABILITIES FOR PERFORMANCE ANALYSIS, MITIGATION EVALUATION, AND HARDWARE VALIDATION. DETAILED COMPUTER SIMULATIONS OF DISTURBED SIGNALS, TOGETHER WITH SOFTWARE IMPLEMENTATIONS OF RECEIVER SIGNAL PROCESSING AND ANTENNA TRACKING ALGORITHMS, WILL BE EMPLOYED TO EVALUATE THE PERFORMANCE OF REPRESENTATIVE ANTENNA TRACKING CONFIGURATIONS. ONCE THE PERFORMANCE ISSUES HAVE BEEN QUANTIFIED, THE FEASIBILITY OF CANDIDATE HARDWARE TEST CONFIGURATIONS WILL BE EVALUATED. A KEY RESULT OF THIS EFFORT WILL BE THE DETERMINATION OF THE NECESSARY CHANNEL MODEL CHARACTERISTICS WHICH MUST BE REPRESENTED TO ACHIEVE A SOUND ANALYSIS AND HARDWARE TEST VALIDATION OF ANTENNA TRACKING SYSTEMS.