GEO data relay for low earth orbit satellites

This paper focuses on a novel, conceptual data relay system for relaying data transfer between low earth orbit (LEO) satellites and a gateway through a geostationary earth orbit (GEO) satellite, developed in the framework of the GeReLEO project. Novel channel adaptive transmission schemes are introduced in addition to the access scheme supporting several LEO satellites in parallel. On top of this, a novel multibeam receiving antenna with several electronically controlled beams is developed for high-rate unidirectional links. The multiple access and transmission schemes, moreover the concept of the multibeam antenna shall be verified with lab demonstrations during the course of the project.