Capacity and Error Rate Analysis of SIMO Satellite Systems over Ka Band at Venezuelan Amazonian

Satellite systems progressively operate in higher frequencies, such as the Ka bands. The signals in Ka band system are seriously affected by the environment constraint. A significant percentage of the VENESAT-1 (Venezuelan Satellite) footprint has the coverage service area over the Amazonian. Due to the large distances from the satellite and the ground station, the signals strength decrease exponentially. Thus, the link quality is degraded which leads to unacceptable error rate and lower system capacities. In order to overcome this problem, the diversity concept can be used. The diversity principle is based on the transmission of multiple copies of the same signal, which can be combined at the receiver or be selected the best copy of the signal. The research aim is to simulate the performance of the Venezuelan Satellite with several receive antennas similar to a SIMO system. The main purpose, is to analyze the system capacity and bit error rate of BER=10 -6 with lower values of E b /N 0 and compare the results with SISO performance.