A High-Speed Facsimile Apparatus for Satellite Communication

This paper outlines a newly developed high-speed facsimile apparatus for satellite communication. An ISO A4 size document can be transmitted in about 3 s at a transmission rate of 1.536 Mbits/s using the apparatus. In the transmitter, a CCD linear image sensor and a fluorescent lamp are used for photoelectric conversion. In the receiver, an electrostatic recording technique using a multistylus electrode is applied. Furthermore, this apparatus applies a new tone-reproduction technique involving electrostatic recording, which makes it possible to reproduce documents, such as photographs, that have gray-level information without reducing the character quality. A facsimile control procedure which takes into consideration satellite communication circuit characteristics is established. The transmitter sends all documents to be sent continuously, receiving the message confirmation response for one document while transmitting the next one. The results of message transmission tests over experimental satellite communication circuits are described.