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Idea: I-2020-03255

LunART- Luna Amateur Radio Transponder: A Communications Platform on the Large European Lander to support communication and payload experiments

Category: Both or other

This idea has been archived

Mar 26, 2021
2
All Authors
We are proposing the LunART Communications Platform on the Large European Lander which will support direct communication with earth through amateur radio frequencies in the microwave bands, support University and Student Payloads with direct access to their experiments, allow Radio Science for a huge community of radio amateur operators and scientists worldwide.  It would also provide an important back-up communication capability and capacity during emergency or when ESA network is busy, for example during non-critical times.

No constraints, just a good line of sight to earth for direct Earth-Moon-Earth communication.

 (Month)
  • Public and Educational outreach (ESERO and STEM)
  • Backup or Secondary Communications Link
  • Easy access for secondary Student/University payloads not interfering with ESA infrastructure
  • Radio Science by a worldwide community

Night Survival

  • Thermal control to ensure temperature not below -10°C.
  • Power down/sleep mode would be possible

Power

  • Bus Voltage: 12..48V unregulated (tbd) or regulated, switchable
  • Power: ~100W
  • Control Output: Normal / Sleep mode / (Power Off)

Antennas

  • S-Band Uplink (2.4 GHz, amateur satellite band)
  • X/Ka-Band Downlink (10.5 GHz, amateur satellite band)
  • Coarse alignment to the earth, Hi-Gain and Low-Gain
  • VHF/UHF (145MHz/435 MHz, amateur satellite band, Omni, optional)
  • Wideband low gain antenna e.g. Vivaldi for various beacon signals

Communications (lander internal)

  • Data Bus (tbd) for other secondary (student and University) payloads
  • Backup interface for lander TTC/TM communication for emergency or uncritical phases of the mission.

 

  1. The "amateur" communication link may be used as a back-up link to our Bochum 20-Meter Antenna or during times when the ESA/DSN network is busy.
  2. The "amateur" communication link may provide independent access to Student/University payloads (for example 24/7 slow scan live cameras).
  3. Use of a huge "worldwide" community of  licensed amateurs (ham radio) for observation and radio science.
office@amsat-dl.org
AMSAT Deutschland e.V.  (AMSAT-DL, non-profit charitable organization)
Germany
  • Peter Gülzow studied communications technologies and has been involved in designing, building, launch campaigns and operating several amateur radio satellites for 30+ years. Peter is also current President managing the AMSAT-DL organization.
  • Matthias Bopp studied communications technologies and has been active in satellite communications for 20+ years.
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STATISTICS
  • Jul 3, 2020
  • 6,536 Views
  • 31 Visitors
  • 2 Comments
  • 3 Followers
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Comments
2
Peter Gülzow

Please have a look at this paper, Design and flight results of the VHF/UHF communication system of Longjiang lunar microsatellites:

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-17272-8

As a part of China’s Chang’e-4 lunar far side mission, two lunar microsatellites for low
frequency radio astronomy, amateur radio and education, Longjiang-1 and Longjiang-2, were launched as secondary payloads on 20 May 2018 together with the Queqiao L2 relay
satellite. [...]  The satellite carried the first amateur radio communication system
operating in lunar orbit, which is a VHF/UHF software defined radio (SDR) designed for
operation with small ground stations.

It is another excellent example how the worldwide amateur radio community, without any boundaries, can contribute to Space Exploration and Science!

Please support us.

Jul 10, 2020 at 09:07 AM · Edited
Andrew Thomas

An exciting, ambitious and well-developed proposal as one might expect from probably the world's leading space radio organisation operating in the Amateur bands.

 

Andy, G0SFJ, author of the LARIE proposal.

Jul 8, 2020 at 10:10 AM