ANTENNA DESIGN
For the wireless transmission aspect of the satellite, we plan to use a 10 m diameter dish antenna on the satellite in conjunction with a 20 m dish antenna on Earth. Since only one antenna on Earth will be used, we will not be in constant view of the satellite. This will not be an issue because our communication will be on a constant loop of all the data on the hard drive. This communication system will operate at a carrier frequency of 7.2 GHz in the X-band in order to help make up for the large amount of loss in the signal due to traveling 10.5 light years. In this section, the link budget, satellite antenna, and aiming of the antenna are discussed.

LinkBudgetPicture