Of course, all of these systems—and emergency responders in general—are largely compromised if communications are down. To enable the instant creation of a reliable communications infrastructure when the land-based network backbone is inaccessible, Starling Advanced Communications created the StarCar antenna system for land vehicles. In this self-contained system, all of the RF and electronics are housed directly on the antenna. The unit is easily installed on any emergency vehicle for critical communications or homeland-security contingency planning. The StarCar solution leverages the firm’s coherent multi-panel antenna (CoMPA) technology, providing up to 40 Mb/s to facilitate voice, streaming Internet and video, and the transmission of other types of heavy files.

Jacob Keret, Starling’s VP of Marketing and Sales, notes that homeland-security, public-safety, and military agencies face many communications challenges. They must continue to provide reliable communication links during events while supporting decision-makers with online data/video from emergency/critical/event scenes. At the same time, they must enable the immediate and reliable transfer of information comprising video, heavy data files, and photos. As Keret emphasizes, “Information from the field is a big strategic advantage for tactical operations and homeland-security and public-safety incidents requiring immediate action.” To bridge public-safety and military networks, Spectrum Signal Processing by Vecima recently partnered with Communications Research Centre Canada. Together, they ported the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials (APCO) Project 25 (P25) public-safety waveform to Spectrum’s flexComm SDR-4000 softwarereconfigurable radio (Fig. 3). Supporting this waveform on a software-reconfigurable radio allows military and other users to more easily communicate with public-safety personnel, thereby better co-coordinating joint emergency efforts. The SDR-4000 multi-purpose, softwarereconfigurable transceiver combines heterogeneous processing including digital signal processors (DSPs), generalpurpose processors (GPPs), and fieldprogrammable gate arrays (FPGAs) in a 3U CompactPCI form factor.

Later this month, what is hailed as the largest commercial satellite ever to be launched will take to the air with the goal of providing integrated satellite and terrestrial mobile services for critical communications. Ideally suited to provide critical services to government, emergency responders, rural communities, and commercial users, the satellite uses 2-GHz spectrum to provide voice, data, and video communications to satellite/terrestrial mobile devices the size of a typical smartphone. By working with Hughes Network Systems, Space Systems/Loral has developed a two-way, ground-based beamforming technology that enables the satellite to re-allocate resources based on demand, thereby maximizing capacity. The satellite will be capable of generating over 500 spot beams covering the continental US, Canada, Alaska, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, and the US Virgin Islands.

In addition to transitioning its lawenforcement department from analog to digital communications, the city of Houston, TX is adding video capabilities to its helicopter fleet. Nucomm and RF Central, part of the Vitec Group’s RF Extreme business unit, are shipping $2.5 million worth of equipment to the city as part of a homeland-security grant. Sean Drew, Business Development Manager of Military, Aerospace, and Government Programs for the Vitec Group, states, “The helicopter transmit system consists of an Access Remote Control System, ChannelMaster 6.5-GHz COFDM transmitter with AES encryption of video, and audio that transmits from a high-gain collinear omni-antenna. The tower and building-based receive systems consist of three high-gain sector antennas and one high-gain steerable antenna. Each antenna output connects to a 1x4 splitter that inputs to each of the three diversity Rx’s at each Rx site. Each of the 4 Rx sites, in turn, uses diversity Rx’s that utilize maximal ratio combining (MRC) to take the signal from each antenna to reconstruct the COFDM signal. Multiple diversity Rx’s at each Rx site allow the HPD to maximize spectral efficiency by using co-channel transmission.”

Microwave companies are clearly innovating to satisfy the call for surveillance, reconnaissance, detection, and communications solutions. Although these varied solutions work to recognize and help eliminate the threats of today, those threats are constantly evolving. Recently, military experts have begun pinpointing the vulnerabilities arising from our dependence on fossil fuels and the nation’s electric grid, which will only be exacerbated by energy demand and climate change. The microwave industry, which largely got its start during World War II, now finds itself with an indispensable role in a battle that has no end in the foreseeable future.