Satellite communication holds great importance in today’s world because it efficiently circulates the signals to the desired location like in remote and rural regions of the earth where even land-based technologies do not show suitability. And at present, active satellites are majorly used.Ĭommunication through satellites facilitates easy and fast signal transmission and reception. As against, active satellites provide the amplified signals to the receiver which is obtained from the source. The operation of passive satellites is such that these simply reflect the signal from the source towards the receiver. Satellites used in communication are of two types, one is active while the other is passive. The operation of a satellite in space is such that it receives the radio signals gathered from the antennas situated on the surface of the earth and retransmits them using a transponder. It uses various artificial satellites that orbit around the earth in order to pass on analog as well as digital signals that carry data, video, and voice to various locations. Satellite communication is a crucial pillar of the global telecommunications system.
If we employ 12 such transponders with 4 MHz of guard band between each transponder, then accommodation of 12 transponders in 500 MHz bandwidth is achievable. The bandwidth of a typical transponder is 36 MHz. It is to be noted here that the bandwidth of the transponder shows dependency on the nature of the signal being carried out by the satellite and the technology used for the transmission.įor typical C-band satellite service, the bandwidth allotted is around 500 MHz and this is divided among various sub-bands where each sub-band is allotted to a single transponder.
But in the case of satellite communication, radio waves cover a quite large space of earth, thus, a proper channel is required which can support the propagation of radio waves from an end to another. Some signals do not require any specific medium and simply get propagated through a vacuum. We know that whenever there is a need for a signal to get transmitted or received between the two ends then a need for a channel exists through which the transmission or reception can take place. Content: Transponder (Satellite Communication)Ī combination of a transmitter-receiver system employed together to execute communication between the two is called a transponder.