Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA)
National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT)
The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) and National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT) performed a verification of regenerative switching functions between an ultra small-size user terminal (45 cm-diameter antenna) and a high-speed small ground station (1.2 m-diameter antenna) using the onboard multi-beam antenna*1 of "KIZUNA," and confirmed that Internet protocol (IP) communications with a transmission speed of 155 Mbps (155 Mega bit per second) were successfully performed. The verification was a part of the initial functional verification jointly conducted by JAXA and NICT between March 28 and April 7, 2008. It is especially noteworthy that the transmission speed of 155 Mbps from a satellite to an ultra small-size user terminal like the antenna of 45 cm in diameter is the fastest in the world.
KIZUNA's operations entered the initial functional verification phase on March 1, and the functions and performance of its onboard equipment are currently being verified. The functions that have been verified so far include the automatic tracking control of the multi-beam antenna and the output of approximately 280 W from the multi-port amplifier.
JAXA will further perform verification of KIZUNA's special features such as mutual connectivity across multiple ground stations, transmission at 1.2 Gbps (1.2 Giga bit per second), and the functionality of the active phased array antenna.