All-round upgrade! Beidou has a new update after a thousand days!

At 10:49 on May 17, my country successfully launched the 56th Beidou navigation satellite using the Long March 3B carrier rocket at the Xichang Satellite Launch Center.

This satellite is a geostationary orbit satellite and the first backup satellite of my country's Beidou-3 project. After entering orbit and completing in-orbit testing, it will be connected to the Beidou satellite navigation system.

Xinhua News Agency (Photo by Yang Zhiyuan)

This launch is the first mission three years after the high-density networking of the Beidou-3 project.

The launch of this satellite will further enhance the system service performance, and is of great significance for promoting the Beidou system's characteristic services and supporting the large-scale application of the Beidou system.

It is understood that the 56th Beidou navigation satellite launched today has been upgraded based on past Beidou satellites and has stronger functions, injecting fresh blood into my country's Beidou navigation system.

Inheriting five major skills, stronger capabilities

The BeiDou-3 project was launched in 2009. Different from foreign satellite navigation systems, the BeiDou-3 system adopts a hybrid constellation mode, consisting of satellites in three different orbits: medium earth orbit (MEO), inclined geosynchronous orbit (IGSO), and geostationary orbit.

Schematic diagram of hybrid constellation. Image source: China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation Fifth Academy

On November 5, 2017, the first batch of BeiDou-3 networking satellites were launched into orbit; on June 23, 2020, the 55th BeiDou satellite was successfully launched into orbit, and the BeiDou-3 system officially completed the construction of the hybrid constellation.

Although there are not many GEO satellites in the BeiDou system, they are responsible for providing enhanced services to improve the technical indicators of the BeiDou navigation system. The 56th BeiDou satellite inherits the characteristics of the previous GEO satellites and has five major capabilities: radio navigation, radio determination, precise single-point positioning, satellite-based augmentation, inter-station time synchronization and positioning. It can provide navigation and enhanced services for users in my country and surrounding areas.

Video source: CCTV.com

At the same time, the development team upgraded some of the satellite's units, significantly enhancing the navigation signal power and information rate, and further improving the continuity and stability of uplink injection. Feng Wenjing, chief designer of the BeiDou-3 satellite from the Fifth Academy, said that with the launch of the satellite, the BeiDou system's regional short message service will be expanded from "three channels" to "four channels", and the system capacity and service performance will be greatly improved.

In addition, the satellite will also optimize the high-precision system design plan through in-orbit test verification, laying the foundation for the continued development of Beidou navigation in the new era.

Comprehensive sources: Xinhuanet, Science and Technology Daily, CCTV.com, etc.