A space-based communications network (100) includes at least one central ground station (116) having a transceiver that is configured to communicate with satellites, such as cube satellites (110). The cube satellites (110) form an ad hoc network of orbital cube satellites, in which each of the cube satellites (110) communicate with each other. One of the cube satellites communicates with the ground station (116). A ground-based control system (1000) communicates with the central ground station (116). The control system (1000) continuously determines a configuration of the ad hoc network (100) and communicates network control information for the cube satellites (110) to maintain communications in the ad hoc network (100). The cube satellites (110) disseminate the network control to each other via the ad hoc network (100).

While suppressing a power consumption of an aerial-floating type communication relay apparatus, an interference in a multi-feeder link of a same frequency between the communication relay apparatus and plural gateway (GW) stations is suppressed. A relay communication station of the communication relay apparatus performs a first interference suppression process and a second interference suppression process by switching therebetween. The first interference suppression process suppresses an interference signal that causes an interference by a transmission signal transmitted from a gateway station and received with a directional beam corresponding to another gateway station, by using a propagation path response estimated with one frequency in a transmission signal band as an estimation frequency based on a reception result of a pilot signal without dividing a transmission signal band of a feeder link. The second interference suppression process divides a transmission signal band of a feeder link into plural divided frequency bands, and suppresses the interference signal by using a propagation path response estimated with one frequency in the divided frequency band as an estimation frequency based on a reception result of a pilot signal, for each of the divided frequency bands.

A communication system consists of a satellite constellation including a number of NGSO satellites, one or more gateways and a control center. The satellites facilitate communication for multiple user terminals. Each gateway communicates with the satellites and user terminals and provides connectivity to the terrestrial networks, and the control center controls operation of the satellites, the gateways and the user terminals. The satellites, the user terminals, the gateways and the control center include hardware that may be software-defined network (SDN) enabled to ensure efficient admission control, precision handover management and quality-of-service (QoS) enforcement algorithms.

According to one or more embodiments herein, interferometry-based satellite location accuracy is provided. In one embodiment, a method comprises: determining, generally at a substantially given time, a reference satellite having a known accurate location within angular proximity of a communication satellite having a known general location; determining an accurate angular position of the communication satellite with relation to the reference satellite from the perspective of at least one ground station antenna of a known accurate location; determining an additional location reference measurement of the communication satellite; determining an accurate location of the communication satellite at the substantially given time based at least in part on the accurate angular position of the communication satellite with relation to the reference satellite from the perspective of the at least one ground station antenna and the additional location reference measurement of the communication satellite; and utilizing the accurate location of the communication satellite.

A multibeam antenna and method of using the same are described. In one embodiment, the antenna comprises an aperture having a plurality of radio-frequency (RF) radiating antenna elements. The RF radiating antenna elements generate a plurality of beams simultaneously in different directions in response to a first modulation pattern for holographic beamforming applied to the plurality of RF radiating antenna elements to establish all beams of the plurality of beams such that antenna elements of the plurality of RF radiating antenna elements contribute to all beams in the plurality of beams concurrently. The antenna also includes a controller coupled to the aperture to generate the first modulation pattern.

A communications system, e.g. an Internet-of-Things (IoT) communications system, includes satellite gateways in addition to terrestrial gateways. High QoS end point devices utilize communications via satellite gateway to be able to communicate with a network server when communications with the network server via terrestrial gateways are unavailable or unreliable. Low QoS end point devices may communicate with the network server via terrestrial gateways but are restricted from using the satellite gateways. An additional receive window, corresponding to the satellite gateway, is used for communicating downlink signals from the satellite gateway to the high QoS end point device.

Embodiments of the present invention comprise a signal processing method and apparatus for use in a satellite payload in which an input RF signal received at a receiver antenna is modulated by using a single optical carrier at the input of an optical modulator. The optical domain signal is processed and is subsequently combined with a single unmodulated optical LO tone to provide an output RF signal for radiation by a transmitter antenna or for further digital processing by an on-board processor. This results in a clean generation of the frequency-converted RF signal at the output of the opto-electrical conversion stage.

A method and a receiver device for detecting the start of a frame of a satellite communication signal. A shaping filtering is applied directly after sampling of the signal, before a frequency correction is applied. During a first phase, an approximate frequency error and a candidate first sample for the start of the frame are estimated by performing several correlations respectively associated with different frequency hypotheses. The samples obtained after sampling or after shaping filtering are buffered during the execution of the first phase. Then, during a second phase, a final candidate sample for the start of the frame is determined from the memorised samples, using the approximate frequency error and the candidate first sample estimated during the first phase.

An apparatus, comprising: means for receiving configured to acquire non-terrestrial network connection assistance information related to non-terrestrial network entities providing non-terrestrial network cells providing coverage to the apparatus; and means for transmitting configured to transmit at least the non-terrestrial network connection assistance information to user equipment within transmission range of the means for transmitting.

Methods, systems, and devices for wireless communications are described. A user equipment (UE) may be configured to receive control signaling indicating a satellite visit time associated with one or more satellites. The UE may be configured to operate in an idle state, an inactive state, or a power-saving state for a time interval which is based on the satellite visit time. The UE may then be configured to monitor for one or more broadcast signals associated with the one or more satellites, one or more network entities, or both, following an end of the time interval which is based on the satellite visit time.