prospects for cubesat technology developments

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The QB50 Workshop in Brussels17./18. Nov. 2009

Prospects for future CubeSat technology developments

Klaus BrießTechnische Universität Berlin, Dptm. of Aeronautics and Astronautics

Chair of Space EngineeringMarchstraße 12, D-10587 Berlin, Germany

Tel. +49-30-314-21339, e-mail: [email protected]

Department of Aeronautics

and Astronautics

QB50 Workshop 17-18 Nov. 2009, Brussels, Belgium 2

Dptm. of Aeronautics and Astronautics

Challenges on Space Technologies

OECD report: "Space 2030: Tackling Society's Challenges" [CORDIS-News, 23.06.2005]

Space technology can be used in particular to tackle five major challenges, according to the report:

1. environmental problems, including natural disasters,2. the use of natural resources,3. the increasing mobility of goods and people,4. growing security threats,5. and the development of the information society.

It is recommended that governments do three broad things:• implement a sustainable space infrastructure; • encourage public use and • encourage private sector participation.

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New Opportunities by CubeSats

• Inspection and repair of space infrastructure

• Dedicated Environment and disaster monitoring missions

• Increase the time coverage or the area coverage of large single Earth remote sensing satellites by supplementation with nano or picosatellites in formation

• Environmental monitoring with high time coverage by satellite formations

• Low-cost missions in science niches• In-orbit verification of new

technologies• Store and forward communication

Pico Satellite constellation for space weatherobservation (Design project of TU Berlin)



Prospective Technologies for Cubesat Bus

• New payload concepts for nano/pico satellite platforms allow special contributions to scientific or operational tasks

• Can the spacecraft bus fulfill the payload requirements, e.g. power, data handling, data transmitting and other?

Spacecraft

Payload Satellite bus

Structure & Mechanisms

Electrical Power System

Thermal Control System

Data Handling System

TT&C-System

Attitude Control System

Propulsion System

Scientific Instruments

Transponder

Meteorological Instr.

Navigation Payload

Military Payload

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Structure and Mechanisms

• Defined by California Polytechnic State University and Stanford University

total mass: max. 1kgCubic-shaped body with 10 cm edgemechanical and material property specifications

• ITAR free flight proven deployment mechanism for single CubeSats available, upgrade for double cubesatsunder development

• Triple picosat deployer under development (ISIS, Netherlands)

Basic Structure of aCubesat of TU Berlin

Double P-Pod Deployer[source: Astro- und Feinwerktechnik GmbH, 2009]



Propulsion SystemPurpose:• For orbit maintenance and formation

flying• In the future: a need for de-orbiting too

State-of-the-Art:• industrial cold gas system for pico

satellite available (Vacco, USA)

Research and development activities:• Electric propulsion systems are in

research• World wide: solid and liquid propulsion

systems are under development• Among others: Aerospace Institute

Berlin and TNO (Netherlands) are developing a pico satellite propulsion systems

Development model of a picosatellite propulsion system basing of the Cool Gas Generator technology of TNO (TNO and TU Berlin)

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Electrical Power System

Purpose:• Supply the satellite with electrical

power at night and day time

State-of-the-Art:• Body-mounted Si- or GaAs- solar arrays• Average power supply: 1,6W• Energy storage: space-preparated Li-

Ion/Li polymer accumulator

Research and development activities:• Foldable solar arrays or thin film solar

generators• Unfoldable or inflatable structure -

hardening by influence of UV light like the Power Sphere Concept of NASA

spacecraft a) before and b) after

deployment of the power sphere

c) inside view of the sphere

[Images: NASA]

a) b)

c)



Tracking, Telemetry and Command System (TT&C)

Purpose:• On-board housekeeping data acquisition• Commanding of the satellite• Communication with ground system

State-of-the-Art:• Using UHF band, preferable in amateur

frequency ranges• Max. downlink rate: 9,6 kbps• First models of S-band transmitters for 256

kbps in orbit (Toronto)

Research and development activities:• Cubesat S-band transmitter for 1 Mbps

(Berlin) is already space qualified on ground and on rocket, on-orbit verification in preparation

UHF-Transceiver for Cubesats(state-of-the-art)

S-Band transmitter for Cubesatsfor 1 Mbps (TU Berlin)

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Thermal Control System

Purpose:• Keep the spacecraft temperature in the

accepted ranges

State-of-the-Art:• Passive thermal Control Systems consisting

of MLI, temperature sensors, heat storage elements

Research and development activities:• Heat storage and control of radiation of

cubesats• Active thermal control elements in MEMS

technologies

MEMS Louverhttp://gsfctechnology.gsfc.nasa.gov/focusAreas/laisThermal.htm



Attitude Control System

Purpose:• Control of attitude for energy generation

and pointing of antennas and payloads

State-of-the-Art:• Passive (no attitude control)• three-axis-stabilization by magnetic coils

Research and development activities:• Sun sensors, magnetic field sensors for

pico satellites, attitude sensors • Reaction wheels for pico satellites just

now in the on-orbit verification phase• High precision attitude control systems

under development

Integrated magnetic coil system for a Cubesat of TU Berlin

3-reaction wheel system for pico satellites (TU Berlin, Astrofein GmbH, DLR)

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BEESATBerlin Experimental and Educational Satellite

Current status:• launched on 23. September 2009

with PSLV-C14• mission in commissioning phase,

some routine experiments are started

Mission Objectives• On-orbit verification of new developed

reaction wheels for pico satellites• Education of students in satellite

design and operation• Verification of picosatellite technologies

BEESAT flight model



Prospective Payload for Double Cubesats: UV-VIS-Mini-Hadamard-Spectrometer (HTS)

• Patent pending from Germany [Wut02]

• Suitable and qualified for space applications

Main units:Diode array spectrometer with • Detector line• Imaging grating • 2-dim. Hadamard Mask as

entrance aperture Hadamard-Transform-Spectrometer [image: Wut02]

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UV-VIS Mini Hadamard Spectrometer (HTS)

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m – measurement dataH – Hadamard Matrixs – signal values (original)sr – reconstructed signalsn – noise




Principle:• The light goes through

a programmable Si-micro slit array, is modulated in space and in n sum spectra divided

• the Signal Noise Ratio will be increased

[image: Wut02]

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Radiometric performance in comparison between a micro-spectometer and the HT-spectometer [Wut02]



Prospective Payload: MEMS-Polychromator in Orbit

Programmable micro spectrometer basing on electrostatic controllable micro grid elements

MEMS-Polychromator [Pis03]

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Prospective Payload Technology for Double or Triple Cubesats: a Deployable Space Telescope

• Deployable space telescope for micro nano and picosatellites

• Applications: Earth monitoring and extra-terrestrial observation

• Project of TU Berlin with support by SMEs and ESA

• Focal length: ca. 0,8m (lab model for a pico satellite)

• ca. 3m for micro satellite• Pushbroom system with 1

panchromatic and 4 multi-spectral channels

Prospective Technology: Dobson Space Telescope on a CubeSat of TU Berlin

Collimation test facility of Dobson Space Telescope



Summary

• ca. 80 universities and few companies and other establishments are developing and investigating pico satellite missions

• The new class of satellites begins to become interesting in the world• Prospective new technologies in sensor or bus technologies helps to

overcome limitations related to size, power and mass of CubeSats• CubeSats will fill operational and science niches of the conventional

and small satellite missions

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Sources and References

[Geo03] T. George, Overview of MEMS/NEMS Technology Development for Space Applications at NASA/JPL, SPIE, 2003.

[Hei00] H. Heidt, J. Puig-Suari, Prof., A.S. Moore, Prof., S. Nakasuka, Prof., R.J. Twiggs, Prof., CubeSat: A new Generation of Picosatellite for Education and Industry Low-Cost Space Experimentation, 14TH Annual/USU Conference on Small Satellites, Logan, Utah, 2000.

[Pis03] A.P. Pisano, Ph. D., MEMS 2003 and Beyond A DARPA Vision of the Future of MEMS, http://www.darpa.mil/MTO/MEMS, 2003.

[Sim04] E.J. Simburger, J.H. Matsumoto, T.W. Giants, A. Garcia III, S. Liu, S.P. Rawal, A.R. Perry, C.H. Marshall, J.K. Lin, S.E. Scarborough, H.B. Curtis, T.W. Kerslake, T.T. Peterson, D. Scheiman Engineering Development Model Testing of the PowerSphere, 45th AIAA/ASME/ASCE/AHS/ASC Structures, Structural Dynamics & Materials Confer, Palm Springs, California, April 2004.

[Wut02] A. Wuttig, R. Riesenberg, Sensitive Hadamard Transform Imaging Spectrometer with a simple MEMS, Paper, Crete 2002.

prospects for cubesat technology developments

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