Digital signal processing for ionospheric propagation diagnostics

For decades, analog beacon satellite receivers have generated multifrequency narrowband complex data streams that could be processed directly to extract total electron content (TEC) and scintillation diagnostics. With the advent of software‐defined radio, modern digital receivers generate baseband c...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Radio science 2015-08, Vol.50 (8), p.837-851
Main Authors: Rino, Charles L., Groves, Keith M., Carrano, Charles S., Gunter, Jacob H., Parris, Richard T.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Algorithms
beacon satellite
Beacon satellites
Computer simulation
Data transmission
Demodulation
Diagnostic systems
Digital
Digital media
Digital signal processing
Digital signal processors
Ionospheric propagation
Modulation
Narrowband
Noise generation
Orbital mechanics
Receivers
Scintillation
Signal processing
Software radio
Total Electron Content
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Summary:For decades, analog beacon satellite receivers have generated multifrequency narrowband complex data streams that could be processed directly to extract total electron content (TEC) and scintillation diagnostics. With the advent of software‐defined radio, modern digital receivers generate baseband complex data streams that require intermediate processing to extract the narrowband modulation imparted to the signal by ionospheric structure. This paper develops and demonstrates a processing algorithm for digital beacon satellite data that will extract TEC and scintillation components. For algorithm evaluation, a simulator was developed to generate noise‐limited multifrequency complex digital signal realizations with representative orbital dynamics and propagation disturbances. A frequency‐tracking procedure is used to capture the slowly changing frequency component. Dynamic demodulation against the low‐frequency estimate captures the scintillation. The low‐frequency reference can be used directly for dual‐frequency TEC estimation. Key Points Digital signal processing facilitates improved low‐SNR performance Frequency tracking is required to extract narrowband modulation Simulation results establish performance bounds for TEC and scintillation diagnostics
ISSN:0048-6604
1944-799X
DOI:10.1002/2014RS005625