Satellite communication system design using locally-stationary orbits

Аuthors

Razoumny Y. N.^1*, Shkolnikov D. A.^2**, Razoumny V. Y.²

1. Moscow Aviation Institute (National Research University), 4, Volokolamskoe shosse, Moscow, А-80, GSP-3, 125993, Russia
2. Bauman Moscow State Technical University, MSTU, 5, bldg. 1, 2-nd Baumanskaya str., Moscow, 105005, Russia

*e-mail: yury.razoumny@gmail.com
**e-mail: dmitry@shkolnikov.net

Abstract

The geostationary circular orbit (GSO) (at the height of approximately 36,000 km with zero inclination) proposed by Arthur C. Clark in the middle of the 20-th century has become very popular for creation of different satellite systems for communication, TV broadcasting and some other purposes. Insertion one or more satellites to geostationary orbits is the best way to provide coverage of big equatorial parts of the globe. In spite of obvious GSO advantages it is clear now that GSO implementation has some difficulties connected with existing limitation for insertion of GSO satellites as well as impossibility to cover the non-equatorial regions of the globe.
The elliptical orbits of Molniya type firstly used for Russian communication satellites of the same name do not have the GSO disadvantages mentioned above. But this type of orbits (with 63,4 deg inclination and perigee and apogee of nearly 500 km and 40,000 km accordingly) can not pretend for universal use.
The locally geostationary orbits (LGO) invented by first author of the present paper in 1987 give the possibility for design of the satellite constellations in more general situations connected with the Earth local coverage. Mathematical description of the LGO includes GSO and Molniya orbits as the particular cases (herewith the GSO is the only circular orbit in the locally geostationary, generally elliptical, class of orbits).
Taking into account that implementation of LGO based on emulation of geostationary observation of the Earth using elliptical orbits is becoming nowadays very popular, the paper contains some new aspects of LGO parameters calculation for different implementations.

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