Sizing of telecommand rate performance for managing science data retransmission over an unreliable channel

摘要

Some investigations about sequences of Bernoulli trials are retrieved from literature and used to obtain two results related to satellite missions delivering large science data volume to Earth: 1) a realistic estimate of the number of data gaps generated during a time interval, relying upon the statistical knowledge of atmospheric effects, and 2) an upper bound of the same quantity which will not be exceeded under any atmospheric condition, to be used when little or no information is available about atmospheric effects. The two results are used to size the telecommand rate performance required to ask retransmission of the lost data. Alternative sizing methods customarily used in mission design are also reviewed, and found to be either too optimistic or hyper-conservative.