Doppler spread characteristics of satellite personal communication channels

Abstract

AbstractThe paper presents a general description of Doppler characteristics of the complex LEO satellite (low earth orbit) to ground terminal channel of S‐PCS (satellite personal communication system). The difference between the terrestrial and satellite PCS radio channels is pointed out. It is shown that in the latter there is a nonzero (average) Doppler shift and a spread being independent of the radial speed of the satellite; this is in contrast to terrestrial situations in which the average Doppler shift is zero. It is also shown that in contrast to terrestrial situations there is no unique relation between the incoming ray angle of arrival and Doppler shift. Doppler spectrum is computed for a realistic distribution of scatterers close to the ground terminal; the spectral density is proportional to 1/ν3 if the ground terminal is stationary, where ν denotes the Doppler frequency. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.