Linshan Xue | Searcharxiv

arXiv2025

Optimized Contact Plan Design for Reflector and Phased Array Terminals in Cislunar Space Networks

Cislunar space is emerging as a critical domain for human exploration, requiring robust infrastructure to support spatial users-spacecraft with navigation and communication demands. Deploying satellites at Earth-Moon three-body orbits offers an effective solution to construct cislunar space infrastructure (CLSI). However, scheduling satellite links to serve users necessitates an appropriate contact plan design (CPD) scheme. Existing CPD schemes focus solely on inter-satellite link scheduling, overlooking their role in providing services to users. This paper introduces a CPD scheme that considers two classes of satellite transponders: Reflector Links (RL) for high-volume data transfers and Phased Array Links (PL) for fast switching and navigation services. Our approach supports both satellites and spatial users in cislunar space. Simulations validate the scheme, demonstrating effective support for user while meeting satellite ranging and communication requirements. These findings provide essential insights for developing future Cislunar Space Infrastructures.

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arXiv2025

Joint Contact Planning for Navigation and Communication in GNSS-Libration Point Systems

Deploying satellites at Earth-Moon Libration Points (LPs) addresses the inherent deep-space coverage gaps of low-altitude GNSS constellations. Integrating LP satellites with GNSS into a joint constellation enables a more robust and comprehensive Positioning, Navigation, and Timing (PNT) system, while also extending navigation and communication services to spacecraft operating in cislunar space (i.e., users). However, the long propagation delays between LP satellites, users, and GNSS satellites result in significantly different link durations compared to those within the GNSS constellation. Scheduling inter-satellite links (ISLs) is a core task of Contact Plan Design (CPD). Existing CPD approaches focus exclusively on GNSS constellations, assuming uniform link durations, and thus cannot accommodate the heterogeneous link timescales present in a joint GNSS-LP system. To overcome this limitation, we introduce a Joint CPD (J-CPD) scheme tailored to handle ISLs with differing duration units across integrated constellations. The key contributions of J-CPD are: (i):introduction of LongSlots (Earth-Moon scale links) and ShortSlots (GNSS-scale links); (ii):a hierarchical and crossed CPD process for scheduling LongSlots and ShortSlots ISLs; (iii):an energy-driven link scheduling algorithm adapted to the CPD process. Simulations on a joint BeiDou-LP constellation demonstrate that J-CPD surpasses the baseline FCP method in both delay and ranging coverage, while maintaining high user satisfaction and enabling tunable trade-offs through adjustable potential-energy parameters. To our knowledge, this is the first CPD framework to jointly optimize navigation and communication in GNSS-LP systems, representing a key step toward unified and resilient deep-space PNT architectures.

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