US-based General Dynamics SATCOM Technologies has finished the installation and testing of two beam waveguide antennas as part of Nasa’s modernisation plan for its deep space network (DSN).
Located near Canberra, Australia, the 112ft-wide antennas use a new servo-control system to better position and point each of the antenna.
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The antennas will improve communication and tracking of space probes on Mars and other spacecraft travelling beyond the galaxy.
General Dynamics Mission Systems vice-president and general manager Mike DiBiase said: "These huge antennas are precision scientific instruments that can pinpoint a location in the universe billions of miles from Earth while connecting scientists with space probes that have left our solar system.
"Each antenna is the width of a football field and weighs about 600,000t, about the same weight as two commercial cruise ships, and built to withstand sustained winds and extremes in heat and humidity to consistently hold its pointing position to within the width of a human hair."
Beam waveguide-style antennas are designed to house sensitive electronics and systems in a room that is inside of the antenna’s ground-based pedestal.
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By GlobalDataIn partnership with Nasa’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, General Dynamics has designed and built nine 34m-long antennas for the DSN, and has upgraded 64m and 70m antennas built in the 1960s.
DSN is a global network of large antennas and communication facilities, located in the US, Spain and Australia.
The network supports interplanetary spacecraft missions and performs radio and radar astronomy observations for the exploration of the solar system and the universe, as well as selected Earth-orbiting missions.
General Dynamics noted that it had designed and delivered 25 12m-long radio telescope antennas for Atacama Large Millimeter/Submillimeter Array (ALMA) Observatory in Chile.
The company is also supplying 64 specially designed antennas for a new radio-telescope array, which is currently under construction in South Africa.
