Guest editorial IJSCN special issue on ASMS/SPSC 2020

Abstract

This special issue of the Wiley International Journal of Satellite Communications and Networking hosts a selection of papers from the 10th Advanced Satellite Multimedia Systems (ASMS) Conference and the 16th Signal Processing for Space Communications (SPSC) Workshop, held virtually on 20–21 October 2020. They were jointly organised by the DLR Institute for Communications and Navigation and JOANNEUM RESEARCH, with the scientific support of the European Space Agency, the University of Bologna and the Graz University of Technology under the auspices of ‘Das Land Steiermark’.

The ASMS conference and SPSC workshop have become recognised events for industry and research institutions to exchange up-to-date information about recent advances and emerging technologies in the field of satellite communication systems. The ESA's SPSC workshop dates back to 1988 when pioneering work in digital signal processing for satellite communications was first presented by worldwide authorities in the field. In addition, following the successful path opened by the 2006 edition of ASMS and continued with regular biannual editions, the scope of the conference has been further widened, as the small though important change in its name by replacing the word ‘mobile’ with ‘multimedia’ testifies. This is remarkable not only because the major part of the satcom market belongs to broadcasting and broadband access operators but fundamentally because the convergence of broadcast, mobile and fixed satellite communications is essential to offer seamless connectivity anywhere at anytime, which is recognised as the key element for the successful deployment of future satellite systems.

This issue collects the extended versions of four of the best papers presented at the 2020 ASMS/SPSC joint event. The papers have been selected with the aim of providing an insight in the developments and findings in this exciting field.

In the first paper ‘QUIC: Opportunities and Threats in SATCOM’, the authors investigate the feasibility of deploying the recently standardised QUIC protocol over satellite networks by analysis in the potentials of its application as well as its shortcomings especially in terms of performance degradation in light of the impossibility of using PEP-based solutions to boost data transfers.

The second paper ‘Supervised Machine Learning for Power and Bandwidth Management in VHTS Systems’ analyses the potential of supervised machine learning solutions applied to the problem of resource allocation for VHTS systems implementing flexible payloads. In particular, the case of performance optimisation achievable by suitably allocating power and bandwidth onboard satellite is investigated. The results obtained by means of effective machine learning solutions outperform classical configurations taken from the existing literature.

In the third paper ‘Design of a 3D ray-tracing model based on digital elevation model for comprehension of large- and small-scale propagation phenomena over the Martian surface’, the focus in on the channel modelling for in-situ Mars communications, by conducting a thorough evaluation of large scale propagation phenomena by suitably extending existing models from terrestrial communications literature. In particular, the main novelty is in the use of 3D ray-tracing approach to support an effective model of Mars communications.

Last but not least, the fourth paper ‘Opportunities and limits of moderate source routing in delay-/disruption-tolerant networking space networks’ introduce a flavour of source-based routing in DTN space networks that traditionally make use of pure contact-based routing. The designed approach allows to better achieve reference QoS targets without significantly complicating the routing protocol operations, which can become particularly burdensome when source-routing is applied over large networks. The performance analysis has been carried out by implementing the proposed solution in a real DTN implementation, hence further confirming the value and the scalability of the proposed solution in real system deployments.

In closing, the Guest Editors would like to thank all individuals and organisations that made this issue possible, including the ASMS/SPSC 2020 Technical and Scientific Committees, all anonymous reviewers and all authors. In particular, we are grateful to Prof. Barry Evans, the Editor in Chief of the International Journal on Satellite Communications and Networking, for kindly inviting us once more to conduct this editorial process, as already done for past events.