Method and apparatus for mitigating the effects of a communications channel using polarized signals

A satellite communication system that dynamically reduces the effects distortion in a communications channel comprising:

• a ground station;
• and
• a transmitter located on a rapidly moving low-earth orbiting satellite linked with said sound station by the communications channel, wherein rapid changes in said communications channel are caused by the rapid movement of the satellite resulting in distortion,
• wherein the ground station comprises:
• a receiver for receiving a data signal having a first linear polarization and a pilot signal having a second linear polarization, said first linear polarization and said second linear polarization being substantially orthogonal, said data signal and said pilot signal being received through said communications channel from the transmitter, the data signal and the pilot signal having the same frequency;
• a channel effects mitigation circuit coupled to said receiver, wherein said channel effects mitigation circuit mitigates channel effects on said data signal using channel distortion information extracted from said pilot signal;
• a channel information recovery circuit coupled between said receiver and said channel effects mitigation circuit, wherein said channel information recovery circuit extracts said channel distortion information from the received pilot signal by comparing the received pilot signal with pilot signal information stored in the ground station,
• whereby the channel information recovery circuit extracts said channel distortion information and the chanel effects mitigation circuit mitigates said channel effect as the satellite moves rapidly with respect to the ground station thereby dynamically compensating for distortion in the communications channel.