Description
A Master of Science thesis in Electrical Engineering by Hessa Ali Hussain Ahmed Ali entitled, “LoRa Sub Milliwatt Transceiver Design to Reduce Space Solutions Mass”, submitted in May 2022. Thesis advisor is Dr. Lutfi Albasha. Soft copy is available (Thesis, Completion Certificate, Approval Signatures, and AUS Archives Consent Form).
Abstract
Space sector is a popular research area. The world is trying to launch different space solutions to improve our life. However, the price of launching any solution is extremely expensive as the price is directly proportional to the mass of the spacecraft and its subsystems. In order to have space accessible to more developers, the design of the spacecraft needs to be optimized to reduce the mass as much as possible. One of the main contributors to this high mass is the harness of the satellite which carries the data within the spacecraft. Thus, the main objective of this research is to introduce an ultra-low power consumption (sub-milli-watt) transceiver using LoRa (Long Range) technology. Specifically, focusing on designing small size transceiver to be used inside CubeSats with minimum possible power consumption that works in Industrial, Scientific and Medical (ISM) band to replace the harness. The design of this Mini Printed Circuits Board (PCB) transceiver is modular to fit any existing PCB designs in the market to be able to collect all the data using Inter-Integrated Circuit (I2C) and distribute it by small antenna using LoRa scheme. The data can be formatted in anyway then received by the mini transceiver to be processed and distributed around the different CubeSat subsystems using LoRa. The solution proposed in this research is unique as it has never been addressed in space applications before, to the best knowledge of the author.