The Effects of Transponder Imperfections on the Error Probability Performance of a Satellite Communication System

The bit error rate (BER) performance analysis of a data communication system is generally based on the assumption that signal waveforms are ideal and hardware-induced distortion is absent. In a satellite communication system, such distortion arises in the satellite repeater, as well as in the transmitter and receiver portions. NASA, which is in the process of developing its Tracking and Data Relay Satellite System (TDRSS), is very much interested in understanding the impact of numerous hardware constraints, that have been identified, on BER performance. The present paper, which treats one segment of this broad problem area, examines the cumulative impact of nine forms of distortion induced by the repeater on BPSK and QPSK signals. These include frequency offset, filter amplitude and phase ripple, phase noise, spurious phase modulation (PM), AM/AM and AM/PM conversion, incidental AM, and spurious outputs. For the present analysis, the transmitter and receiver are assumed to operate in essentially ideal fashions and thermal noise is introduced at the receiver front end only. Computed results indicate that BPSK and QPSK performances are impacted in substantially different manners, with QPSK generally more sensitive to a given form of distortion. One noteworthy example is the combined impact of the phase noise and spurious PM parameters which affect BPSK only slightly, but lead to very rapid QPSK performance degradation as the parameter values increase. This and the other distortion effects are illustrated via computed parametric performance curves. Results also demonstrate the need to account for interactions among distortion parameters.