Tagged: hamsci

Talks and Poster Presentations from the HamSCI 2021 Virtual Workshop

HamSCI is an organization dedicated citizen radio science and specifically the "publicity and promotion of projects that advance scientific research and understanding through amateur radio activities". Back in March they held their HamSCI 2021 workshop online, and the videos from presentations and posters are now all available on the Ham Radio 2.0 YouTube channel.

Most of he presentation videos were released back in June, but the poster talks were just released in the past few days. Many of the projects mentioned in the talks involve the use of software defined radios.

The talks include multiple presentations on the HamSCI personal space weather station project, updates on the TangerineSDR and lots of ionosphere research.

HamSCI 2021: iPoster Breakout Room 1

ARRL/TAPR Digital Communications Conference: Held Online for Free from September 11-12

Just a few days prior to the 2020 GNU Radio conference, ARRL and TAPR will hold their yearly Digital Communications Conference (DCC) online. DCC is a yearly conference with many SDR and RF related talks, with a focus on ham radio science. The talks will be live streamed on YouTube for free, however you can register for $30. Registration will grant you the ability to ask questions or chat via Zoom, and includes access to the papers. The YouTube live link has not been provided yet, so keep an eye on the DCC web page for the announcement.

The schedule of talks can be viewed here, and below we're listing the talk titles.

  • HamSCI PSWS Overview/Status
  • HF Propagation Measurement Techniques and Analyses
  • Early Results of Festival of Frequency Measurement Experiment & June 21, 2020 Asian Eclipse
  • Frequency Estimation Techniques
  • LC-PSWS Engineering Status
  • PSWS Control Software and Database
  • Evaluation of uBlox GPS Receivers Performance
  • TangerineSDR Hardware Update
  • TangerineSDR VLF Module (A new module!)
  • Characterizing and Optimizing the behavior of a Ground-based Magnetometer for Ionospheric Space Weather Observations
  • Mobile Mesh Tower Fleet
  • Design Tips for QSD Down Conversion SDR Designs
  • Packet Compressed Sensing Imaging (PCSI: Robust Image Transmission over Noisy Channels
  • Continued Lessons from the RF-Seismograph
  • Current Status Report of FX.25 KISS TNC Development
  • APRS Performance and Limits
  • Digital Signal Processing: I2S in ESP32
  • Aids to the Presentation and Analysis of WSPR Spots: TimescaleDB Database and Grafana
  • QMesh: A Synchronized, Flooded Mesh Network Protocol for Voice
  • GaN based RF Power Amplifier Design
  • The AERO/VISTA Twin Small Satellite Project
  • ENAMS (Electromagnetic Noise Area Monitoring System)
  • PSWS Antenna Designs
  • RF Machine Learning Applied to doing Cognitive Radio on HF
  • Improved Layer 2 Protocol
  • FreeDV 700D and 202
  • Forward Error Correction and Pictures from Mars

Talks from the 2020 HamSCI Convention (Held Online)

HamSCI is an organization dedicated citizen radio science and specifically the "publicity and promotion of projects that advance scientific research and understanding through amateur radio activities". Recently they held their HamSCI 2020 workshop online, and the videos are now available on the Ham Radio 2.0 YouTube channel. Several of the projects mentioned in the talks involve the use of software defined radios.

Come join HamSCI at its third annual workshop! Due to restrictions caused by the COVID-19 Coronavirus, this year's workshop will he held as a virtual, eletronic workshop. The meeting will take place March 20-21, 2020 using Zoom Webinar Services hosted by The University of Scranton in Scranton, PA . The primary objective of the HamSCI workshop is to bring together the amateur radio community and professional scientists. The theme of the 2020 HamSCI Workshop is "The Auroral Connection: How does the aurora affect amateur radio, and what can we learn about the aurora from radio techniques?" Invited speakers include Dr. Elizabeth MacDonald, NASA Scientist and founder of Aurorasaurus, Dr. James LaBelle, Dartmouth Space Scientist and expert on radio aurora, and Dave Hallidy K2DH, an expert in ham radio auroral communication.

One talk discusses the HamSCI personal weather station project, which is an SDR and Raspberry Pi based solution that monitors HF signals like WSPR, as well as characterizing HF noise, detecting lightning and ionospheric disturbances.

HamSCI 2020 Overview of the Personal Space Weather Station and Project Update

Another talk discusses the TangerineSDR, which is an open source SDR currently in development by TAPR. The goal of the TangerineSDR is to be a sub $500 SDR with a focus on space science, academic research as well as general amateur use. 

HamSCI 2020 TangerineSDR Data Engine and Overall Architecture

The rest of the talks can be found on the Ham Radio 2.0 YouTube playlist.

The TangerineSDR: A Scientific SDR For Space Weather Radio and More

Over on YouTube the Ham Radio 2.0 has uploaded an interview with Scotty (WA2DFI) from TAPR who talks about a new software defined radio called the TangerineSDR that is expected to be released mid-2020. 

The TangerineSDR will focus on scientific use cases such as the HamSci Personal Space Weather Station, ground satellite stations, academic research and RF sniffing. The goal is to have a modular SDR that can be produced cheaply for educational institutions, whilst having the capability to be upgraded to a high performance version for the space weather station.

The TangerineSDR is a Modular Software Defined Radio Project with the following objectives:

  1. Development of SDR radios that allow experimentation in a variety of radio modes.
  2. Provide support to unaffiliated other groups that need these radios to support their mission.
  3. To provide hardware modularity so that the user can have a functioning radio with different subsets of the possible components.
  4. To allow varying performance so that beginners can have a functioning radio with a minimum of parts, yet allow an expert user more functionality as needed.
  5. To allow users to experiment with differing configurations of data collection, networking, transport and visualization.

In the Video Scotty shows off a mock-up of the TangerineSDR. The video description by Ham Radio 2.0 reads:

Presented at the TAPR Digitial Communications Conference of 2019, Scotty, WA2DFI, shows us a mock-up of a newly designed radio for Space Weather, and many other things, dubbed the Tangerine SDR. This modular radio is planning to be in production by mid-2020, with a working prototype to show at the 2020 Orlando Hamcation. Take a look at this short video and let me know what you think.

Tangerine Scientific SDR Space Weather Radio - FirstLook

For more information see tangerinesdr.com and the TangerineSDR mailing list.