Patent ID: 7978641

Claim:
A method of uplinking data, comprising the steps of: (a) selecting a communications channel frequency domain bandwidth and a communications channel dwell time for receiving the data from a first plurality of ground stations disposed in a first cell; (b) directing one or more of a plurality of receive antennae to the first cell and dwelling the one or more of the plurality of receive antennae on the first cell for the selected dwell time, to receive a first uplink transmission comprising the data from at least one ground station of the first plurality of ground stations disposed in the first cell at a time directed by information transmitted on an auxiliary channel in time slots and at frequencies that are pre-selected; and (c) frequency domain bandfiltering the first uplink transmission by the selected communications frequency domain channel bandwidth; wherein the communications channel frequency domain bandwidth and communications channel dwell time are selected according to a factor selected from the group comprising an uplink data rate requirement and a throughput utilization requirement.