Since the first developments of Cryogenic LNA in S- and Ka-Band in 1999 for ESA Deep Space Station (DSS) in New Norcia (Australia) followed by 2 other Cryogenic LNAs in X- and Ka-Bands for ESA DSS in Cebreros (Spain) and Malargüe (Argentina), Callisto has acquired a know-how and continues to improve its products with disruptive innovations.
Today, Callisto is proud to announce the development of a new X-Band cryo-cooled feed prototype for ESA DSS.
This new generation of receiver will replace the current room temperature feeder system and cryogenic LNAs.
Several functionalities were required to meet operational constraints and avoid outage time for the operation:
- On the RF side, a proper redundancy concept based on an electro-mechanical cryogenic transfer switch has been implemented to redirect the received signal to the redundant channel in case of LNA failure.
- The feed components are cooled down to cryogenic temperature using two cryogenic coolers (nominal mode). If one cooler is defective, an innovative technical solution has been developed to be able to disconnect and replace a faulty cryogenic cooler while the second one is still operated. In this case (degraded mode), the RF chain is still operated at cryogenic temperature.
In 2018, this prototype unit will be upgraded to become an operational unit in 2019.
Callisto offers other Cryogenic LNA : the Ultra model with the best Noise Temperature and the Compact model with no maintenance for 10 years and suitable for remote locations where the energy consumption criterion is important (a video is available).