Amazon Technologies, Inc.

Baosheng Li

Deepak

Ali Masoomzadeh

Mohammad Mamunur Rashid

Bulin Zhang

Sandeep Ahluwalia

A satellite provides communication between user terminals (UTs) and ground stations that connect to other networks, such as the Internet. Because the satellite is within range of many UTs at any given time, many UTs are in contention to use an uplink to send upstream data to the satellite. This saturates a random-access channel (RACH) on the uplink. When a UT has data to uplink, it sends a short buffer data status (SBDS) message using the RACH. The minimal size of the SBDS facilitates use of a non-orthogonal multiple access uplink. Based on the SBDS, the satellite allocates a grant to the UT to use the uplink. Additional messages from the UT involving buffer status may be sent using the granted uplink. Unsolicited grants may be issued to the UT based on analysis of uplink and downlink traffic. If needed, the RACH may still be used to request additional grants.

Satellite uplink management system

Technologies directed to scheduling transmissions between a satellite system and customer terminals (CTs) with half-duplex (HD) radios are described. A communication system includes a radio, a modem with a HD controller, a downlink (DL) scheduler, and an uplink (UL) scheduler. The HD controller determines a first set of HD CTs that are eligible DL transmissions for a first radio frame and a second set of HD CTs that are eligible for UL transmissions for a second radio frame. The HD controller determines a throughput value and buffer information about each of the first set and the second set of HD CTs. The HD controller determines a first subset of HD CTs for DL scheduling and a second subset of HD CTs for UL scheduling. The DL scheduler schedules radio resources for a first radio frame and the UL scheduler schedules radio resources for a second radio frame.

Coordinated mac scheduling of half-duplex customer terminals in satellite internet systems

A satellite provides communication between user terminals (UTs) and ground stations that connect to other networks, such as the Internet. Because the satellite is within range of many UTs at any given time, many UTs are in contention to use an uplink to send upstream data to the satellite. Contention for the uplink may be managed by sending grants that allocate a portion of the uplink time and frequency resources to individual UTs. A UT serviced by the satellite uses information based on the grants to determine whether upstream data from a user device connected the UT should be accepted for future transmission promised to deliver specified quality of service to the user device. Acting as a distributed system, each UT may decide to approve upstream data based on one or more factors, such as source address, destination address, header flags, predicted radio availability, and so forth.

System for distributed management of satellite uplink communication

Satellites provide communication between devices such as user terminals (UTs) and ground stations that are in turn connected to other networks, such as the Internet. Latency for signals to and from the satellite can introduce delays due at least in part to propagation time. The latency adversely interacts with data transfers that result in responses from the UT. Downstream data to the UT is processed to determine if a response is expected. Header data is associated with the downstream data that is sent to the satellite. A resource scheduler onboard the satellite uses the header data to provide a prospective grant to the UT to send the expected response. The UT receives the downstream data, response data such as an acknowledgement is generated, and the response data is sent to the satellite using the prospective grant. The system substantially reduces the latency associated with responsive traffic and improves overall throughput.

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Kirkland, WA, United States of America

Baosheng Li