Usage of microwaves in satellite television and telephone
- Microwaves are used to carry telephone calls and television channels as digital signals from ground station to satellites and vice versa. They are used for communications because they pass through the atmosphere without significant attenuation and they can be directed in beams with much less diffraction than radio-waves.
- The micro-wave frequencies are of the order of 10 GHz, sufficiently high to carry much more information than a copper cable or radio-waves. They allow thousands of telephone calls and several television channels to be transmitted at the same time.