EURASIP Journal on Wireless Communications and Networking Satellite Communications Guest Editors: Ray E. Sheriff, Anton Donner, and Alessandro Vanelli-Coralli Satellite Communications EURASIP Journal on Wireless Communications and Networking Satellite Communications Guest Editors: Ray E. Sheriff, Anton Donner, and Alessandro Vanelli-Coralli Copyright © 2007 Hindawi Publishing Corporation. All rights reserved. This is a special issue published in volume 2007 of “EURASIP Journal on Wireless Communications and Networking.” All articles are open access articles distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Editor-in-Chief Luc Vandendorpe, Universite´ Catholique de Louvain, Belgium Associate Editors Thushara Abhayapala, Australia David Gesbert, France Marc Moonen, Belgium Mohamed H. Ahmed, Canada Fary Z. Ghassemlooy, UK Eric Moulines, France Farid Ahmed, USA Christian Hartmann, Germany Sayandev Mukherjee, USA Alagan Anpalagan, Canada Stefan Kaiser, Germany Kameswara Rao Namuduri, USA Anthony Boucouvalas, Greece G. K. Karagiannidis, Greece AmiyaNayak,Canada Lin Cai, Canada Chi Chung Ko, Singapore A. Pandharipande, The Netherlands Biao Chen, USA Visa Koivunen, Finland Athina Petropulu, USA Yuh-Shyan Chen, Taiwan Richard Kozick, USA A. Lee Swindlehurst, USA Pascal Chevalier, France Bhaskar Krishnamachari, USA Sergios Theodoridis, Greece Chia-Chin Chong, South Korea S. Lambotharan, UK George S. Tombras, Greece Huaiyu Dai, USA Vincent Lau, Hong Kong Lang Tong, USA Soura Dasgupta, USA DavidI.Laurenson,UK Athanasios V. Vasilakos, Greece Ibrahim Develi, Turkey Tho Le-Ngoc, Canada Weidong Xiang, USA Petar M. Djuric,´ USA Wei Li, USA Yang Xiao, USA Mischa Dohler, France Yonghui Li, Australia Xueshi Yang, USA Abraham O. Fapojuwo, Canada Tongtong Li, USA Lawrence Yeung, Hong Kong Michael Gastpar, USA Zhiqiang Liu, USA Dongmei Zhao, Canada Alex Gershman, Germany Stephen McLaughlin, Scotland Weihua Zhuang, Canada Wolfgang Gerstacker, Germany Sudip Misra, Canada Contents Satellite Communications,RayE.Sheriff, Anton Donner, and Alessandro Vanelli-Coralli Volume 2007, Article ID 58964, 2 pages Multi-Satellite MIMO Communications at Ku-Band and Above: Investigations on Spatial Multiplexing for Capacity Improvement and Selection Diversity for Interference Mitigation, Konstantinos P. Liolis, Athanasios D. Panagopoulos, and Panayotis G. Cottis Volume 2007, Article ID 59608, 11 pages Investigations in Satellite MIMO Channel Modeling: Accent on Polarization,Peter´ Horvath,´ George K. Karagiannidis, Peter R. King, Stavros Stavrou, and Istvan´ Frigyes Volume 2007, Article ID 98942, 10 pages Performance Analysis of SSC Diversity Receivers over Correlated Ricean Fading Satellite Channels, Petros S. Bithas and P. Takis Mathiopoulos Volume 2007, Article ID 25361, 9 pages Advanced Fade Countermeasures for DVB-S2 Systems in Railway Scenarios, Stefano Cioni, Cristina Parraga´ Niebla, Gonzalo Seco Granados, Sandro Scalise, Alessandro Vanelli-Coralli, and Mar´ıa Angeles Vazquez´ Castro Volume 2007, Article ID 49718, 17 pages Capacity Versus Bit Error Rate Trade-Off in the DVB-S2 Forward Link, Matteo Berioli, Christian Kissling, and Remi´ Lapeyre Volume 2007, Article ID 14798, 10 pages Frequency Estimation in Iterative Interference Cancellation Applied to Multibeam Satellite Systems, J.P.Millerioux,M.L.Boucheret,C.Bazile,andA.Ducasse Volume 2007, Article ID 62310, 12 pages A QoS Architecture for DVB-RCS Next Generation Satellite Networks,ThierryGayraudand Pascal Berthou Volume 2007, Article ID 58484, 9 pages Maximum Likelihood Timing and Carrier Synchronization in Burst-Mode Satellite Transmissions, Michele Morelli and Antonio A. D’Amico Volume 2007, Article ID 65058, 8 pages Burst Format Design for Optimum Joint Estimation of Doppler-Shift and Doppler-Rate in Packet Satellite Communications, Luca Giugno, Francesca Zanier, and Marco Luise Volume 2007, Article ID 29086, 12 pages TCP-Call Admission Control Interaction in Multiplatform Space Architectures, Georgios Theodoridis, Cesare Roseti, Niovi Pavlidou, and Michele Luglio Volume 2007, Article ID 23923, 8 pages Efficient Delay Tracking Methods with Sidelobes Cancellation for BOC-Modulated Signals, Adina Burian, Elena Simona Lohan, and Markku Kalevi Renfors Volume 2007, Article ID 72626, 20 pages Analysis of Filter-Bank-Based Methods for Fast Serial Acquisition of BOC-Modulated Signals, ElenaSimonaLohan Volume 2007, Article ID 25178, 12 pages Hindawi Publishing Corporation EURASIP Journal on Wireless Communications and Networking Volume 2007, Article ID 58964, 2 pages doi:10.1155/2007/58964 Editorial Satellite Communications Ray E. Sheriff,1 Anton Donner,2 and Alessandro Vanelli-Coralli3 1 Mobile and Satellite Communications Research Centre, School of Engineering, Design and Technology, University of Bradford, Richmond Road Bradford BD7 1DP, UK 2 German Aerospace Center, Institute of Communications and Navigation, Oberpfaffenhofen, 82234 Wessling, Germany 3 ARCES, University of Bologna, Via Toffano 2, 40125 Bologna, Italy Received 28 November 2007; Accepted 9 December 2007 Copyright © 2007 Ray E. Sheriff et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. We are delighted to bring to you this special issue on satel- ing: accent on polarization” looks at MIMO systems from the lite communications, which we have prepared as part of the polarization diversity point of view and dwells on the satellite spreading of excellence remit of the satellite communica- cooperative communication concepts. tions network of excellence (SatNEx). The SatNEx project, Switch and stay combining (SSC) is a form of diversity which began in 2004, is funded for five years under the Euro- technique used in digital receivers to compensate for fade pean Union’s Sixth Framework Programme (FP6) Informa- events introduced by the mobile channel. The third paper tion Society Technologies (IST) Thematic Area. Led by the “Performance analysis of SSC diversity receivers over corre- German Aerospace Center, SatNEx brings together a network lated Ricean fading satellite channels” investigates the per- of 24 partners, distributed throughout Europe, with mem- formance of dual-branch SSC receivers for different fading bership drawn from ten countries. channel characteristics. The philosophy underlying the SatNEx approach re- The next four papers deal with the emerging scenario volves around the selection of focused actions under Joint of mobile digital video broadcasting (DVB-S2 and RCS mo- Programmes of Activities, which are carried out collectively bile). Alternative approaches to counteracting fading chan- by the partners and include research, integration, and dis- nels introduced when operating in a train environment re- semination activities. Training represents an important part ceiving satellite DVB-S2 are presented in the paper “Ad- of the SatNEx remit and is supported through a number of vanced fade countermeasures for DVB-S2 systems in railway initiatives including the hosting of internship projects and an scenarios.” Here, as a result of simulation analysis, antenna annual summer school. diversity and packet-level forward error correction mecha- The call for papers resulted in a high number of submis- nisms are proposed and their impact is evaluated with respect sions, from which we have been able to select 12 excellent to the receiver design and system complexity. The theme of papers dealing with the different aspects of satellite commu- DVB-S2 is continued with the paper “Capacity versus bit er- nications and navigation. ror rate trade-off in the DVB-S2 forward link,” which inves- Multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) techniques are tigates how satellite capacity can be optimised for DVB-S2 attracting a considerable amount of attention from within transmissions. The DVB return channel via satellite (DVB- the terrestrial wireless community. The first paper of this spe- RCS) is then addressed in “Frequency estimation in iterative cial issue, “Multisatellite MIMO communications at Ku band interference cancellation applied to multibeam satellite sys- and above: investigations on spatial multiplexing for capac- tems,” which considers the application of interference cancel- ity improvement and selection diversity for interference mit- lation on the reverse link of a multibeam satellite system, us- igation,” considers the application of such technology over a ing DVB-RCS with convolutional coding as an example. The satellite platform operating in the Ku band and above. The paper “A QoS architecture for DVB-RCS next-generation paper considers how MIMO can be used to increase capac- satellite networks” proceeds to design and emulate a quality- ity by using a satellite spatial multiplexing system and how of-service (QoS) architecture that demonstrates using real antenna selection can be used to mitigate interference. The multimedia applications how QoS can be supported over a next paper “Investigations in satellite MIMO channel model- DVB-RCS network. 2 EURASIP Journal on Wireless Communications and Networking Synchronization aspects are dealt with in “Maximum likelihood timing and carrier synchronization in burst-mode satellite transmissions.” The paper addresses the problem of achieving synchronisation for a burst-mode satellite trans- mission over an AWGN