About Broad Reach
Founded in 1997, Broad Reach Engineering Company produces spaceflight hardware and software solutions, integrating vehicle design, component design and engineering services for aerospace, scientific, commercial and military customers on four continents.-
Recent Blog Posts
Blog Post Categories
Blog Archives
-
RSS
Spaceborne GPS Receivers
The IGOR design is based on the NASA/JPL Black Jack space-borne GPS Receiver. The Black Jack receiver is a revolutionary spaceflight Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver developed by NASA/JPL to fill future needs for orbit-based GPS science.
The IGOR design continues the evolution of the Black Jack receiver and previous units and incorporates several improvements based on the experiences made with the Black Jack on previous NASA/JPL missions including CHAMP, SAC-C, Jason-1, and GRACE. To date 9 IGOR receivers have been deployed as primary science payload on the COSMIC mission, TerraSAR-X, Tandem-X and the TACSAT-2 missions. Additional receivers are due to be launched soon.
GPS Occultation Science
A technique relying on the simple fact that a planet’s atmosphere acts much like a variable density lens, bending and slowing the propagation of microwave signals passing through it from the Ionosphere down to the surface. The lens effect results from decreasing atmospheric density with altitude. If the positions of transmitting and receiving satellites are precisely known, the “atmosphere delay” can be measured precisely, the time derivative of which (Doppler) can be inverted to give atmospheric density vs. altitude information. The IGOR Occultation GPS Receiver is designed to meet all the requirements of such occultation science experiments. In addition, the IGOR also provides the functionality of a POD GPS receiver with a payload controller, and a solid state recorder.
Features
IGOR Specifications
PYXIS NAUTICA
Next Generation Precision Orbit Determination + Occultation GNSS Receivers
The Pyxis Line of spaceborne GNSS receivers is the next generation of GNSS receivers based on the highly successful IGOR receiver. The Pyxis incorporates the lessons learned from the IGOR design and implements a number of improvements and upgrades made possible by recent technology developments.
The Pyxis line is based on the BRE440 CPU and a new BRE developed GNSS ASIC/FPGA. Logic miniaturazation and processing improvements allow reduction of the receiver size by at least a factor of 2 while increasing radiation and electrical performance. A new RF front-end and digital section improve signal-to-noise ratio as well as sampling resolution. The addition of L2C and L5 frequencies and eventually Galilleo frequencies provide increased Occultation Data and improved PVT resolution. Software improvements include the addition of a customer API for custom code development and the addition of GNSS Attitude determination ability.
The Pyxis receiver is available as a stand-alone receiver or 3U cPCI board LEO Precision Orbit Determination receiver (Pyxis-POD), as a Radio Occultation and POD GNSS Receiver (Pyxis-RO), and as a GEO Precision Orbit Determination receiver (Pyxis-GEO).
Pyxis-POD
Pyxis-GEO
PYXIS-POD / PYXIS-GEO
Typical PYXIS-POD / PYXIS-GEO Dimensions in mm
Pyxis-RO
PYXIS-RO to IGOR Comparison