| Volume 4, | Number 1 | March/April 1996 |
An innovative telecommunications satellite project could one day read utility meters, trace intercontinental cargoes or observe oil field equipment. This nontraditional satellite project is led by Final Analysis Inc., a Maryland aerospace telecommunications company that is partnering with the Center for Space Power (CSP) at the Texas Engineering Experiment Station (TEES).
The FAISAT (Final Analysis Inc. SATellite) system will include a number of low-orbiting satellites that will pick up data transmitted from remote locations on the Earth on a periodic basis. When needed, customers can then access the transmitted data. For example, your utility meter reading could be beamed up to a satellite once a month for billing by the utility company.
"This satellite technology, called FAISAT, will serve a worldwide niche market that doesn't need constant 'real-time' data, or that just needs data occasionally," said CSP deputy director Dr. David Boyle. TEES is a research agency in the Texas A&M University System. The CSP is one of eleven NASA Centers for the Commercial Development of Space.
With one satellite launched in January 1995 and another planned for the early spring of 1996, Final Analysis Inc. and the CSP continue to develop the remote terminals to beam data to the low-orbiting satellites, added center director Dr. Fred Best.
Texas A&M electrical engineering professor Costas Georghiades and Ph.D. student Predrag Spasojevic are focusing on improving the overall transmission system for FAISAT. Georghiades notes that remote terminals have limitations that are diverse, from dealing with smaller antennas to balancing power needs with health considerations. "We're looking beyond the present system capabilities of both the satellite and the remote terminals. We're conducting tests to resolve different problems over the next several months," Georghiades said. "We want a design for the second, maybe the third, generation of systems for Final Analysis."
In the laboratory, researchers are tackling such problems as signal loss between satellite and transmitter caused by frequency changes from the Doppler effect. They combine computer simulations with tests on telecommunications hardware, which duplicates outside conditions, such as atmospheric disturbances, tunnels and other real-world transmission obstacles.
The January 1995 FAISAT satellite represented several firsts and some unique collaborations. Russia was the low bidder to launch the satellite and launched it from a Russian military base on January 24, after it was flown there by the U.S. Air Force. The Air Force had a new technology experiment on the satellite's test platform. Russia put the satellite into orbit using equipment originally developed for nuclear missiles.
The CSP assists Final Analysis with environmental testing, the design of transceivers and the identification of experiments to fly in the satellite's unused sections. The company is led by its president, Dr. Nader Modanlo, an expert for more than 10 years in space systems engineering, with a key role in several NASA projects.
Russian engineers at the Plesetsk, Russia, military base carefully mount the Final Analysis satellite onto the launching ring, a technology originally developed to launch nuclear warheads.
For more information on FAISAT, contact Mike Downey at TEES. Phone: 409/845-5524, E-Mail m-downey@tamu.edu Please mention that you read about it in Innovation.
