Patent ID: 11881882
Assignee: IRIDIUM SATELLITE LLC
Field: Telecommunications (Electrical engineering)
Classification: CPC H | IPC H

Claim 12:
13. A wireless, satellite communications terminal comprising:
a multi-element antenna having a plurality of antenna elements, wherein each of the antenna elements include transmit/receive modules;
a plurality of preliminary signal combiners, each preliminary signal combiner configured to combine received signals output by a corresponding pair of two antenna elements, wherein:
the signal output by a first one of the pair of antenna elements provides a model of interference present in the received signal output by the second one of the pair of antenna elements, and
the preliminary signal combiner is configured to combine the signal output by the first antenna element with the signal output by the second antenna element to produce an initial interference-mitigated signal;

a plurality of phase shifters configured to apply complex weights to corresponding interference-mitigated signals to produce complex-weighted versions of the corresponding interference-mitigated signals and effectively steer a main beam of the multi-element antenna to facilitate reception of a desired signal;
another signal combiner configured to combine the complex-weighted versions of the interference-mitigated signals to produce an interference-mitigated output signal; and
a controller to set the complex weights applied by the plurality of phase shifters to steer the main beam of the multi-element antenna array to facilitate reception of the desired signal.