2022/05/31 by Xiaowen Tian, Tian, Xiaowen, Nuria Gonzalez-Prelcic +3 · 1 citation
Engineering · #Advanced Wireless Communication Technologies #FOS: Electrical engineering #Optical Wireless Communication Technologies #Satellite Communication Systems #Signal Processing (eess.SP) #electronic engineering #information engineering
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2205.15528
openalex publication_date 2022/05/31 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite communications (SatCom) are considered a promising solution to provide uninterrupted services in cellular networks. Line-of-sight (LoS) links between the LEO satellites and the ground users are, however, easily blocked in urban scenarios. In this paper, we propose to enable LEO SatCom in non-line-of-sight (NLoS) channels, as those corresponding to links to users in urban canyons, with the aid of reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (RISs). First, we derive the near field signal model for the satellite-RIS-user link. Then, we propose two deployments to improve the coverage of a RIS-aided link: down tilting the RIS located on the top of a building, and considering a deployment with RISs located on the top of opposite buildings. Simulation results show the effectiveness of using RISs in LEO SatCom to overcome blockages in urban canyons. Insights about the optimal tilt angle and the coverage extension provided by the deployment of an additional RIS are also provided.