A statistical model for evaluating GOPEX uplink performance

This article describes a statistical model to analyze the signal intensity received at the solid-state imaging (SSI) camera of the Galileo optical communications system from an Earth-based transmitter (GOPEX) demonstration. The analytical model assumes that the optical beam possesses a Gaussian profile and the communication channel has a log-normal scattering characteristic. The atmospheric-induced jitter is modelled as two independent zero mean Gaussian random variables. By modelling the system parameters as a set of independent and identically distributed (iid) random variables, the combined impact of uncertainties due to system parameters and the turbulent atmosphere can be approximated by a log-normal distributed signal intensity at the spacecraft. A Monte-Carlo software simulation package was also developed to compute the confidence interval probabilities for general optical beam profiles. Numerical results show that the approximation is valid for a wide range of operation scenarios.