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EOC obtains a “world receiver”

January 09, 2013

 Installation of the Antenna
zum Bild Installation of the Antenna
.
 Installation of the Reflector
zum Bild Installation of the Reflector
.
 The KA-Band Antenna in the Evening Sun
zum Bild The KA-Band Antenna in the Evening Sun
EOC staff recently braved winter weather to install a new antenna on the roof of their building. It has a 7.3 meter diameter antenna reflector and can receive data from earth observation satellites at rates up to 600 megabits per second, 600 times the performance of a standard DSL link. Next-generation data reception—global real-time transmission of earth observation recordings—will be tested with this antenna.

Earth observation satellites constantly supply data from all parts of the world, and their resolution is continually increasing. They are used for such purposes as mapping forest fires, ocean ice fields, natural disasters, and oil spills, where time is a critical factor.

The vision for the future anticipates “live” data transmission following the example of communication satellites. Geostationary relay satellites in permanent visual contact with earth observation satellites take over their data. A network of relay satellites then passes on these data around the world at the speed of light to ground stations, for example in Oberpfaffenhofen.

Today, these data sometimes require several hours or even days to reach their users. The reason? The data can only be delivered when the earth observation satellite is in direct visual contact with a ground station. Until then, the data have to be stored on board the satellite. If the satellite’s storage capacity is too low, the data may have to be transferred to very remote ground stations which lack a link to the worldwide high speed network.

New transmission approaches are urgently required because of the enormous amounts of earth observation data being collected, and these can now be tested with EOC’s new antenna. It will serve in the future as a bridgehead to the geostationary relay satellite AlphaSAT. This communication satellite is to be launched in summer 2013 and for the first time will be capable of optical reception of earth observation data transmitted to it via lasers. Enormous amounts of data can be transferred through space in the shortest possible time with the help of lasers. However, subsequent transfer to a ground station will be handled via microwave transmission. In contrast to lasers, microwaves are hardly disturbed by Earth’s atmosphere and make possible smooth reception of data independent of weather conditions. The newly installed antenna uses the Ka-band at a frequency of 26 gigahertz.

 KA-Band Antenna
zum Bild KA-Band Antenna


Das EOC in den Medien - Archiv
BBC NEWS: Antarctic's Pine Island glacier produces giant iceberg
Süddeutsche.de: From Space for the Earth
SPIEGEL ONLINE:
Drones: Unmanned Aerial Vehicles in Use in USA and Germany (in German)
Chrismon.de: Cold waves in heaven above (in German)
Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung: Global Change (in German)
Deutschlandradio Kultur: The virtual Observatory of the Alps
DRadio Wissen: Geographers intend to explore wetlands via satellite images
SPIEGEL ONLINE: Satellite Image of the Week
n-tv online: DLR's best Satellite Images
Galileo das Wissenschaftsmagazin:
„Is ist true - destruction of the rain forest“ (from 2:55)
Sueddeutsche.de: "Bambi shall not die"
"Mit modernster Technik den Schutz von Wildtieren verbessern"
Nürnberger Nachrichten: "Rettung für die Rehe"
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