Communications satellite repeater

摘要

A communications satellite repeater having input demultiplexers for demultiplexing input beams to a plurality of first channels each having a first bandwidth, switches for interconnecting each input channel to desired output channel on a channel by channel basis, amplifiers, and output multiplexers for multiplexing output channels to output beams is improved by the particular structure of the switch. The present switch (8) has filter banks (9) for providing a plurality of second channels each having a second bandwidth narrower than said first channels by dividing each of said first channels, which can also operate as bandwidth-variable filter banks by multiplexing the adjacent second channels, switches (10) coupled with said filter banks (9) to interconnect said second channels, and multiplexers (11) for multiplexing the second channels at the ouptut of said switches (10) to provide output channels. Thus, each transponder can interconnect a plurality of beams.