System Issues Related to Satellite Communications in a Nuclear Environment

Nuclear induced signal scintillation effects are of great importance in design and deployment of military satellite systems that must provide survivable and enduring communications service. The induced scintillation will result in Rayleigh signal fading with limited signal decorrelation time and coherent bandwidth of the transmission channel as well as reduced signal power due to terminal antenna scattering loss. This paper addresses the system design and operational constraints caused by high altitude nuclear effects to satellite communications link performance.