ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Andre MakovskyAndre Makovsky received his B.S. (1984) and M.S. (1985) in electrical engineering from the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (Troy, New York). He joined JPL in January 1986 and has worked in telecommunications system development on Galileo, Cassini, Deep Space 1 (DS1), 2001 Mars Odyssey, Mars Exploration Rover (MER), Deep Impact, and Mars Science Laboratory (MSL). For each project, he developed the telecommunications link performance tools used during preproject, prelaunch, and in-flight. Prior to his retirement in 2014, he was a senior engineer in the Communications Systems and Operations Group of the Flight Communications Systems Section.
Mr. Makovsky did extensive prelaunch system performance tests in the JPL Telecommunications Development Laboratory and with the Deep Space Network's Compatibility Test facilities at JPL, in a mobile Compatibility Test Trailer at spacecraft contractor sites, and at the Eastern Test Range at Cape Kennedy, Florida. He participated in extensive testing of Small Deep Space Transponders both at the contractor (General Dynamics, formerly Motorola) in Phoenix, Arizona and at JPL for DS1, Mars Odyssey, Space Infrared Telescope Facility, MER, and MSL.
Co-Author of Chapter 7 from Volume 13 of the Deep-Space Communications and Navigation Series:
Mars Exploration Rover Telecommunications
Co-Author of Chapter 8 from Volume 13 of the Deep-Space Communications and Navigation Series:
Co-Author of the following article of the DESCANSO Design & Performance Summary Series - Telecommunications: