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As if it wasn’t enough that the Starlink network satellites degrade the images of the night sky in the visible region. Recent research has shown that the Starlink constellation pollutes the night sky in the radio region of the electromagnetic spectrum, even at wavelengths that are protected for radio astronomy purposes.
Federico Di Vruno. Credit: F. Di Vruno.
As Federico Di Vruno of the SKA Observatory and the International Astronomical Union discovered with his colleagues, the electronics on board the Starlink satellites “leak” low-frequency radio waves unrelated to data transmission between these satellites and the Earth’s surface. This is an unpleasant discovery for radio astronomers. The researchers thus managed to prove the previously predicted radiation from these satellites. It turned out to be measurable.
The sky around Earth is becoming increasingly crowded, and the impact of satellites on astronomy is a growing concern. SpaceX alone operates almost 4,700 satellites, and their number is expected to multiply. And they are not alone. OneWeb has over 600 of them, and Amazon wants to put thousands of them into orbit starting in 2024.
Stralinks rampage in the visible region (2019). Credit: Global Meteor Network.
Satellites such as the Starlink network typically use radio frequencies between 10.7 and 12.7 GHz to communicate with Earth. But as it turned out, other radio waves are also emitted. Di Vruno and colleagues used the LOw Frequency ARray (LOFAR) radio telescope network, which includes about 20 thousand antennas at a total of 52 locations, to observe 68 selected satellites of the Starlink network.
Unfortunately for SpaceX, they succeeded. LOFAR detected radio radiation in the 110 to 188 MHz range from 47 of the mentioned 68 satellites. This range includes the 150.05 to 153 MHz band, which is specially protected for radio astronomy by the regulations of the International Telecommunications Union.
It is apparently an inadvertent leak from the electronics of the satellites. It is also true that, purely formally, Starlink satellites do not violate any rules and regulations, as they technically only apply on Earth. However, this is a huge problem for radio astronomers. The more Starlinks there are in orbit, the stronger their jamming radiation will be. That’s why scientists are putting intense pressure on SpaceX to do something about it immediately — at least for satellites not yet in orbit. We’ll see how they do.
Literature
Astronomy & Astrophysics online.
2023-07-11 00:36:24
#SpacexX #problem #Radio #radiation #leaking #Starlinks
