Code Migration and Optimization for Calculating Atmospheric Attenuation in RF Link Budgets Within Glenn Research Center Communication Analysis Suite

This technical report encompasses development completed on the Glenn Research Center Communication Analysis Suite (GCAS) as it relates to converting code from the original MATLAB® (The MathWorks, Inc.) GCAS code base to C++. It focuses on a majority of the functions, structures, and intermediate code developed for radiofrequency (RF) links calculations. The report serves as a comprehensive record of the current progress and outlines the technical challenges overcome during this research. Throughout this project, numerous functions and structures were migrated end to end, with validation test cases conducted in accordance with NASA’s verification and validation efforts for standard models and simulations. This report also provides high-level documentation of the completed work; detailed low-level documentation has been compiled to provide a line-by-line explanation in alignment with NASA’s goals. This development has largely been focused on atmospheric effects on calculating RF link budgets for both terrestrial and space links. Some developments outside of atmospheric functions are also covered throughout this report; these are largely related to mathematical operations and MATLAB® structure conversions.