Left:  CRC's Chris Iles testing MEOSAR (Medium Earth Orbit Search and Rescue) satellite beacons for the next generation search and rescue system during a visit to the Arctic.
Right:  CRC's Chris Iles poses with an antenna installation enabling communications with the North.
Credit:  Photo: J. Lang, PCSP/NRCan

For most of us, getting up and going to work everyday is pretty uneventful. We haul ourselves out of bed, flip the switch on the coffee maker and as it burbles away, we brush our teeth and pull on office-appropriate clothing before heading out the door. But for the Communications Research Centre's (CRC) Chris Iles, Supervisor of Satellite Network Systems Integration, the beginning of the work day can be anything but routine, with an Arctic sleeping bag replacing his cozy bed, coffee brewed over a cook stove while keeping an eye on the horizon for hungry bears, and the donning of attire fit for a polar expedition.

Iles is a specialist in the design and building of cutting-edge satellite communications networks. As part of the SMART program - Satellite Multimedia Application Research and Trials Program - Iles sets up demonstration networks that bring high-end communications to people who wouldn't otherwise have access to them. His job, by necessity, takes him to some of the harshest environments on the planet, places where terrestrial communication networks are not an option.

"Most people don't understand what you can do over satellite," says Iles. "Once they can see what can be done they begin thinking of applications. The more a demonstration network can do, the more ideas people get, and the more ideas people feed us, the better the next demonstration becomes."

Iles spent several weeks in the summers of 2008 and 2009 in and around Resolute, Nunavut, developing a satellite communications network for the Polar Continental Shelf Program (PCSP). PCSP, an organization within NRCan, provides logistical and support services to research teams working in Canada's North. Among their services, PCSP supplies equipment to field-research teams, transports teams to and from remote study sites, and maintains research facilities and infrastructure at the base station in Resolute. A critical part of this research infrastructure is a communications network with the capacity and capabilities required by scientists at the forefront of polar research.

"For many of the scientists going through PCSP, it is either their last contact with the Internet before going out in the field or their first contact with the Internet after being out for weeks collecting data. They need to move serious amounts of information, either pulling it down or pushing it south."

And that, says Iles, is a problem in the Arctic where satellite infrastructure is limited and very expensive. With an average of 50 to 60 researchers in residence at PCSP at any one time, the PCSP network was working with an average upload speed was 384 kb per second for downloads, and 124 kb per second for uploads. To put that in concrete terms, it would take almost 3 hours to send a 5 MB file. Video conferencing, VoIP communications, and the transmission of large data files, including image, audio and video files, was simply not an option.

To solve the problem, Iles redesigned the network, creating several virtual networks on top of a single infrastructure. While the commercial carrier is still in place for handling the low-bandwidth applications such as e-mail and access to web pages, the high-bandwidth applications are handled by a separate virtual network which is linked, via Telesat's AnikF2 Ka band satellite, to Canada's high speed research network, CANet4, giving PCSP, for the first time ever, the bandwidth to function as a true research centre.

But setting up communications networks in the Arctic, Iles notes, has its own peculiar problems. Coaxial cable, for example, which is used to transmit high-speed signals between buildings, shatters like glass at -50 °C. And the extreme temperature changes that characterise the polar climate play havoc with connectors, as the plastics, metals and other materials expand and contract at different rates. Even the simplest of tools can have surprising properties.

"I was using a 36-inch aluminium pipe wrench to bolt down a satellite dish at about -40 °C. Because of the wind you have to really tighten these things down, so I was hauling back with all my weight when the wrench shattered in my hands and I did a back flip off the satellite dish. The only reason I wasn't hurt was the snow cushioned my fall."

While the use of industrial-grade equipment would solve at least some of the problems, the cost would render the networks impractical. "An industrial-grade switch costs around $10,000. A normal commercial switch costs $500."

That means, says Iles, that a large part of his job is designing innovative ways to make commercial products function in these harsh conditions. In the case of the coaxial cables, that meant keeping them warm in a truck until the moment they were laid, then laying them at breakneck speed before they could freeze. For the connectors, Iles and his team designed climate-controlled boxes to protect them from the extreme changes in temperature. And the pipe wrench crisis was averted by going door-to-door in a small community to find a temporary replacement. "The great thing about working in the North is that everyone knows everyone, and everyone pitches in."

One of the hardest things, though, says Iles, is debugging the system once it's installed. Satellite networks are sensitive and complicated, each with its own individual peculiarities. Under normal circumstances it can take up to a month to thoroughly debug a system, but when working in remote areas under brutal conditions, the task must be carried out in two to three days.

While Iles' job may not sound like a picnic to those of us who like our morning double-double, Chris thrives on the challenge. "There is no one system that's best for all situations, so what I have to do is take existing hardware then I push it to its limits by either modifying it slightly, or by making it do things it was never intended to do. It's a lot of fun."

For more information contact Chris Iles, Supervisor of Satellite Network Systems Integration, at 613-998-2734 or chris.iles@crc.gc.ca.