Ephemeris Determination Using a Connected Element Interferometer

This paper describes a connected element interferometer that has been developed and is operating with collection elements in Tucson and Phoenix with a separation of 180 km. Coherence between the collection sites of better than 50 picoseconds is achieved through two-way time transfer over a commercial fiber optics link. The description of hardware and software implementation, as well as measurement results of several operating satellites, are presented. Consider analysis is also presented to demonstrate the projected system performance against different targets, based on the characteristics of the measurement using the existing Tucson-Phoenix link.
See also ADM001507. Presented at the 34th Annual Precise Time and Time Interval (PTTI) Planning Meeting (34th) held in Reston, VA on 3-5 December 2002. The original document contains color images.