{"id":18972,"date":"2019-06-09T15:01:52","date_gmt":"2019-06-09T19:01:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?p=18972"},"modified":"2019-06-09T15:01:52","modified_gmt":"2019-06-09T19:01:52","slug":"student-and-amateur-cubesat-news-roundup-june-9-2019","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?p=18972","title":{"rendered":"Student and amateur CubeSat news roundup – June.9.2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

A sampling of recent articles, press releases, etc. related to student and amateur CubeSat<\/a> \/ SmallSat projects and programs:<\/p>\n

** Crowd-funding chip-sats<\/a> released into orbit on second try<\/strong>: Inexpensive chip-size satellites orbit Earth | Stanford News<\/a><\/p>\n

A swarm of 105 tiny satellites the size of computer chips, costing under $100 each, recently launched into Earth\u2019s orbit. Stanford scientist Zac Manchester, who dreamed up the ChipSats, said they pave the way for cheaper and easier space exploration.<\/em><\/p>\n

…<\/em><\/p>\n

Each ChipSat is a circuit board slightly larger than a postage stamp. Built for under $100 apiece, each ChipSat uses solar cells to power its essential systems: the radio, microcontroller and sensors that enable each device to locate and communicate with its peers. In the future, ChipSats could contain electronics tailored to specific missions, Manchester said. For instance, they could be used to study weather patterns, animal migrations or other terrestrial phenomena. Spacefaring applications might include mapping the surface features or internal composition of asteroids or moons orbiting other planets.<\/em><\/p>\n

…<\/em><\/p>\n

In 2009, while studying with Cornell professor Mason Peck, Manchester envisioned how to engineer the electronic essence of a satellite into a device even cheaper and easier to build than a CubeSat. In 2011, he crowdfunded his project by putting it on Kickstarter.com, quickly raising about $75,000 from 315 contributors, and what he initially called the KickSat project was born. \u201cI want to make it easy and affordable enough for anyone to explore space\u201d is how Manchester put it at the time.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Prof. Zac Manchester sent a swarm of postage-stamp sized satellites into orbit. (Image credit: L.A. Cicero<\/a>)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The first attempt in 2014 failed when the CubeSat containing the ChipSats did not open before de-orbiting. The re-designed KickSat-2 was attached along with other smallsats to a Northrop-Grumman Cygnus cargo vehicle launched to the ISS last November.\u00a0 After the Cygnus departed from the ISS, the small satellites were deployed into orbit. Then on March 18th, the 105 ChipSats were released from their CubeSat mothership.<\/p>\n

That moment finally came, when the deployment commands were transmitted from the 60-foot dish behind the Stanford campus. Another anxious day passed before Manchester learned that the sensitive dish antenna had detected the faint signals from the ChipSats, which meant they were operational. Manchester worked with collaborators around the world to track the ChipSats as they transmitted data until reentering the atmosphere and burning up on March 21.<\/em><\/p>\n

More about the project:<\/p>\n