Novel Architecture for Beacon Signal Generation in Satellite Applications

Beacon is a signal that signifies its presence to the world and it can be used to retrieve the relative position of a satellite or to perform propagation experiments through the atmosphere. In this paper we demonstrate the feasibility of applying a new methodology to generate continuous wave beacon signal on a satellite, by taking advantage of the existing components by which a transponder is built, without interfering with its normal operation. This original use of existing hardware architectures will be demonstrated to have many advantages, not only concerning overall power consumption, but also from cost and space saving point of view. All these are key properties when talking about satellite and in particular CubeSats operational performance.