New wide band advanced predistortion lineariser for space applications

This paper proposes a new predistortion lineariser architecture allowing a new advanced shape tuning capability in addition to the classical magnitude control of the gain expansion and phase shift. This new feature is compatible with a wide band operation. A frequency bandwidth of 1.8 GHz has been demonstrated with a Ku-band TWTA between 10.95 and 12.75 GHz. A C/I3 improvement of about 20 dB at -6 dB IBO per carrier and a NPR increase of 7 dB at -6 dB IBO were obtained thanks to this new lineariser concept with regard to a conventional diode predistortion lineariser. This advanced lineariser is currently introduced in the new Thales Alenia Space Linearised Channel Amplifier space equipment (LCAMP).