From the last Blink milestone – Horizon 2020 SME Instrument Phase 1, the Blink team has been working on the further development of the product. Progress has been made in the following areas:
• Software Demodulation – Since the only prerequisite for software processing is that signal is digitized, we have continued to implement data acquisition (DAQ) steps in software. Experimental software demodulation works by parallelising signal processing, like in other processing steps (frame synchronization, descrambling, error detection and correction, packet extraction), yielding further performance improvements.
We plan to continue optimising algorithms and transferring processing to software as much as possible with the thoughtful use of COTS and multi-purpose technology to its full capacity and capability.
• Basic Support for DVB-S2 Standard – Beside full support for CCSDS, we extended Blink with basic support for the DVB-S2 standard, as it is often present in NewSpace missions. Blink aims to be a flexible and multi-protocol solution, and we plan to continue following that path in the future.
• Full Chain DAQ and Processing for Earth Observation (EO) – We have closed the loop from space to the ground and manage to independently receive and visualise data captured with sensors of weather satellite Meteor-M2. We constructed a DAQ station in our lab in Zagreb and had prepared gallery of images at http://meteor.amphinicy.com/. By visiting the website, you can get a sense of how intuitive and rich Blink reports are. All mission and acquisition parameters are exposed as well as detailed processing statistics on all processing levels (CADU, VCDU and ISP).
• Blink and Omnisat Bundled Solution – Amphinicy has established a partnership with a Belgian company, Antwerp Space. Blink was integrated with the Antwerp Space EO data receiver, Omnisat, to provide a turnkey DFEP (demodulator and front-end processor) that could support up to 1 Gbps. The bundled solution is multi-protocol and modular. It supports standard modulation and coding schemes and offers a rich reporting suite. Marketing material for the new product is still in preparation. In the meantime, you can learn more about Omnisat solution on product's page.
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This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 699132.
This article reflects only our view and the European Commission is not responsible for any use that may be made of the information it contains.