Operators on the ground will communicate with CatSat through a set of ground stations around Tucson.
For command and control signals at UHF frequencies (~437 MHz), the team has a primary station on the University of Arizona campus and a backup station at a private location off campus. The primary station consists of a set of two 18 foot 10 inch cross polarized Yagi antennas. This station is located on the roof of the new Applied Research Building, adjacent to the Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering building. The antennas are visible looking north from Speedway Avenue when driving past the University. Communication through the UHF system is how the team will send commands to and receive telemetry signals from the spacecraft.
At X-band frequencies (~10 GHz), the team is working with Rincon Research Corporation to use the 6.1 meter dish located at the Tech Park southeast of campus. This dish, formerly part of the CARMA array, provides a powerful platform for receiving large amounts of data from our payloads.
In recognition of CatSat's use of frequencies allocated for amateur radio, amateur radio operators around the world will be able to interact with the mission as well. When the HF antenna onboard is recording, operators at HAM stations anywhere in the world with an HF transmitter will be able to send signals to the spacecraft. Once the data is received on the ground and published, those same operators can search for their signal in our data to see if they were heard and how their signal was affected by the atmosphere. Additionally, the spacecraft has the capacity to operate as a linear transponder, with an uplink at ~5.66 GHz and a downlink at ~10.47 GHz. When active, amateur radio operators will be able to communicate with other HAMs long distances away through CatSat.