Journal of Aeronautics & Aerospace Engineering
Open Access

Lunar Communications

4^th International Conference and Exhibition on Satellite & Space Missions

June 18-20, 2018 | Rome, Italy

Xavier Geneste, David Gomez Otero, Francisco Javier de Pablos Martin, Tomas Navarro and Octavio Camino

ECSAT - ESA, UK
RHEA - ECSAT ESA, UK
AJILON � ECSAT ESA, UK

Scientific Tracks Abstracts: J Aeronaut Aerospace Eng

Abstract :

Recent discoveries of possible existence of water in the South Pole of the moon, the popularity growth on missions to Mars, the reduction of the launch cost and more affordable technology, are some of the key aspects which have triggered a growing interest in the moon exploration by a number of governmental and private organizations during the latest years. Today, most of the big players are planning activities at the moon for the upcoming ten years in diverse areas (i.e. governmental, tourism, science, imaging and mining). Lunar Communications mission aims at enabling the development of a wide range of missions at the moon by providing a backbone lunar communication and navigation infrastructure. The mission is proposed as a game changer, especially for small-medium size missions by providing data relay communication and localization services, reducing the complexity, weight and costs of the payloads and outsourcing the operations and logistics, thus de-risking lunar missions and attracting new initiatives to the moon. The communications architecture is planned to be fully compatible with the International Communication System Interface Standards Document being finalized within the Interagency Operations Advisory Group (IOAG) standard services and Consultative Committee on Space Data Systems (CCSDS) forums. This intends to simplify, not only the architecture by offering services compatible with internationally agreed frequency and modulation schemes allocations, but the interaction with the future users that would just need to build their systems compatible with the standards.

Biography :

Xavier Geneste works for aerospace industry since 1989 as an Electronics Engineer. He has been working on spacecrafts for the three majors in France, Aerospatiale (then Alcatel Space and now Thales Alenia Space), Astrium (now Airbus Defense and Space), CNES (National Center for Space Research) on a wide range of activities from project initiation to launches. He is currently working at European Space Agency since 2009 as a Senior Spacecraft Engineer and is dealing with new technologies developments for the telecommunication platforms (ARTES program).