Implementation of Adaptive Antenna Array for Ground Station Tracking System

Abstract

As the number of small satellites keeps increasing due to the low-cost development and fast delivery duration, there is a demand for higher capacity and capability of the ground station tracking system. Generally, the existing ground station tracking system faces major performance degradation while tracking satellites because of signals interference and multi-path fading. These problems motivate researchers to come out with interesting solution to mitigate the degradation performance. This paper describes the implementation of adaptive beam forming algorithm of phased array antenna for ground station tracking system. The adaptive antenna array demonstrates electronically self-steering radiation pattern capability towards satellites signals, suppress interferences and multi-path signals. This can be achieved by adapting the Least Mean Square (LMS) algorithm by varying the number and phase of the array antenna elements and the angle of beam steering to determine the Direction of Arrival (DOA) of incoming signals. The performance of adaptive LMS algorithm is investigated in MATLAB software by analyzing the radiation patterns for different number of array antenna elements, phases and beam steering angle. The purpose of LMS algorithm implementation in the Adaptive Array Antenna (AAA) system is to control weights adaptively, optimize the Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) of the desired signal and minimize the Mean Square Error (MSE).