'bordschaltungsanordnung for satellites in a nachrichtensatellitensystem

摘要

An on-board processing system is disclosed for a communications satellite which employs spot beam antennas. Since each spot beam antenna in general, sees only one ground station, this allows the same frequencies to be used by all stations. Using this space-division technique, the on-board processing involves the switching from origin grouping of incoming communications signals to destination grouping of outgoing communications transmissions. This switching is accomplished by means of a distribution frame. The distribution frame includes storage registers which logically control the partitioning of the voice-channel segments and the switching times. The contents of all of the storage registers can be changed by command.