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A variable-rate modulation and coding scheme for low earth orbit satellites

Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellites are increasingly being used for a wide variety of communications applications. These satellites have to operate in widely varying channel conditions. These conditions are often significantly better than the 'worst case' situations that are experienced and thus a sing...

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Main Author: Butchart, Kevin Robert
Other Authors: Braun, Robert
Format: Thesis
Language:English
Published: Department of Electrical Engineering 2016
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access_status_str Open Access
author Butchart, Kevin Robert
author2 Braun, Robert
author_browse Braun, Robert
Butchart, Kevin Robert
author_facet Braun, Robert
Butchart, Kevin Robert
author_sort Butchart, Kevin Robert
collection Thesis
description Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellites are increasingly being used for a wide variety of communications applications. These satellites have to operate in widely varying channel conditions. These conditions are often significantly better than the 'worst case' situations that are experienced and thus a single rate transmission scheme is clearly suboptimal. The objective of the thesis is to suggest and test a method of modulation/coding that can take advantage of better signal strength conditions in order to improve data transmission rates. In order to provide the goal of approximately 50kbps transmission in a 10kHz Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA) channel it was necessary to consider spectrally efficient, rather than power efficient, modulations. The proposed modulation scheme makes use of an eight-dimensional trellis coded modulation system. Multiple signal constellation sets are used in conjunction with this coding in order to provide different transmission rates, depending on the signal to noise ratio and the channel state. To enhance the suitability of the modulation scheme for the channel, it was combined with Reed-Solomon Coding and interleaving in an inner/outer code arrangement. Various means of determining when to switch between coding rates were discussed briefly, but an in-depth treatment of the subject fell outside of the scope of the thesis. Various combinations of these codes were tested in gaussian noise conditions and various degrees of Rician and Rayleigh fading. In order to make use of the higher rate QAM constellations, it was necessary to provide the decoder with channel state information. The tested system achieved its purpose of providing a variable rate coding scheme resulting in good performance over a range of channel conditions. It is fairly flexible and can be adapted to specific channel requirements.
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institution University of Cape Town (South Africa)
language eng
last_indexed 2026-06-10T12:31:28.055Z
license_str Not specified — see source repository
provenance_str_mv Harvested via OAI-PMH from UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository
publishDate 2016
publishDateRange 2016
publishDateSort 2016
publisher Department of Electrical Engineering
publisherStr Department of Electrical Engineering
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source_str UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository
spelling oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/19247 A variable-rate modulation and coding scheme for low earth orbit satellites Butchart, Kevin Robert Braun, Robert Electrical Engineering Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellites are increasingly being used for a wide variety of communications applications. These satellites have to operate in widely varying channel conditions. These conditions are often significantly better than the 'worst case' situations that are experienced and thus a single rate transmission scheme is clearly suboptimal. The objective of the thesis is to suggest and test a method of modulation/coding that can take advantage of better signal strength conditions in order to improve data transmission rates. In order to provide the goal of approximately 50kbps transmission in a 10kHz Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA) channel it was necessary to consider spectrally efficient, rather than power efficient, modulations. The proposed modulation scheme makes use of an eight-dimensional trellis coded modulation system. Multiple signal constellation sets are used in conjunction with this coding in order to provide different transmission rates, depending on the signal to noise ratio and the channel state. To enhance the suitability of the modulation scheme for the channel, it was combined with Reed-Solomon Coding and interleaving in an inner/outer code arrangement. Various means of determining when to switch between coding rates were discussed briefly, but an in-depth treatment of the subject fell outside of the scope of the thesis. Various combinations of these codes were tested in gaussian noise conditions and various degrees of Rician and Rayleigh fading. In order to make use of the higher rate QAM constellations, it was necessary to provide the decoder with channel state information. The tested system achieved its purpose of providing a variable rate coding scheme resulting in good performance over a range of channel conditions. It is fairly flexible and can be adapted to specific channel requirements. 2016-04-28T07:18:13Z 2016-04-28T07:18:13Z 1999 Master Thesis Masters MSc http://hdl.handle.net/11427/19247 eng application/pdf Department of Electrical Engineering Faculty of Engineering and the Built Environment University of Cape Town
spellingShingle Electrical Engineering
Butchart, Kevin Robert
A variable-rate modulation and coding scheme for low earth orbit satellites
thesis_degree_str Master's
title A variable-rate modulation and coding scheme for low earth orbit satellites
title_full A variable-rate modulation and coding scheme for low earth orbit satellites
title_fullStr A variable-rate modulation and coding scheme for low earth orbit satellites
title_full_unstemmed A variable-rate modulation and coding scheme for low earth orbit satellites
title_short A variable-rate modulation and coding scheme for low earth orbit satellites
title_sort variable rate modulation and coding scheme for low earth orbit satellites
topic Electrical Engineering
url http://hdl.handle.net/11427/19247
work_keys_str_mv AT butchartkevinrobert avariableratemodulationandcodingschemeforlowearthorbitsatellites
AT butchartkevinrobert variableratemodulationandcodingschemeforlowearthorbitsatellites