GEO Satellites as Space Weather Sensors
Abstract
We have acquired and analyzed >1 million hours of geostationary communications satellite housekeeping telemetry from commercial operators and have correlated the data with space weather observations and models. We analyzed two component types: solar cells and high power amplifiers. For amplifiers, we identified the occurrence of anomalies is not random with respect to the space weather environment. There appears is relationship to high-energy electron fluence between 10 - 21 days before the anomalies. From simulation and electron beam lab tests, we demonstrated that a potential cause may be internal charging which occurs in the amplifier chain. We also calculated on-orbit degradation of both Si and GaAs solar cells and quantified the degradation of the cells during severe solar proton events of 10 MeV protons. We compared the data with several combinations of space weather environment solar cell degradation models; predicted performance is within 1 of the observed degradation. We developed algorithms that find any unusual behavior in satellite health telemetry without requiring training data. Once identified, we collect and analyze them, along with assessing space weather observations and operational environment factors, and rank them by their importance.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Apr 26, 2016
- Accession Number
- AD1008320
Entities
People
- Ashley Carlton
- Kerri Cahoy
Organizations
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology