A microterminal satellite data communication system

An experimental microterminal satellite data communication system known as CODE has been developed by the European Space Agency with support from universities, research organisations and industry. The system, which operates at Ka band, consists of a large number of microterminals with 80 cm diameter antennas which can communicate directly in a mesh network at 64 kbit/s. A central hub station is used for channel allocation and for general monitoring and control of the microterminals. The system supports a wide range of standard application software which can run on standard personal computers and workstations. The design rationale of the system is described together with some of the applications and demonstrations that have been transmitted over the Olympus satellite to date