Related papers: Nanosatellite aerobrake maneuvering device
The New Horizons spacecraft was launched on 19 January 2006. The spacecraft was designed to provide a platform for seven instruments that will collect and return data from Pluto in 2015. The design drew on heritage from previous missions…
Spacecraft kinematics, peak perihelion temperature and space environment effects during solar-radiation-pressure acceleration for a beryllium hollow-body interstellar solar sail inflated with hydrogen fill gas are investigated. We…
CubeSat-based nanosatellites are composed of COTS components and rely on its structure and standardized interfaces. A challenge in the nanosatellites context is to adapt the V\&V (Verification and Validation) process to answer to the…
One of the primary objectives of small satellites is to reduce the costs associated with spacecraft development and operations as compared to traditional spacecraft missions. Small satellite missions are generally able to reduce mission…
AcubeSAT is an open-source CubeSat mission aiming to explore the effects of microgravity and radiation on eukaryotic cells using a compact microfluidic lab-on-a-chip platform. It is developed by SpaceDot, a volunteer, interdisciplinary…
The CUbesat Solar Polarimeter (CUSP) project is a CubeSat mission planned for a launch in low-Earth orbit and aimed to measure the linear polarization of solar flares in the hard X-ray band by means of a Compton scattering polarimeter. CUSP…
The coupled attitude and orbit dynamics of solar sails is studied. The shape of the sail is a simplified quasi-rhombic-pyramid that provides the structure helio-stablility properties. After adimensionalisation, the system is put in the form…
We conduct a systematic survey of the regions in which distant satellites can orbit stably around the four giant planets in the solar system, using orbital integrations of up to $10^9$ yr. In contrast to previous investigations, we use a…
We confirmed four spectroscopic binary candidates using new observations obtained with SALT. Three SB2 systems (HD 20784, HD 43519A, HD 62153A) exhibit circular orbits with periods shorter than 10 days, whereas one hierarchical triple…
This paper reports a design study for a space-based decametric wavelength telescope. While not a new concept, this design study focused on many of the operational aspects that would be required for an actual mission. This design optimized…
Aperture photometry was performed on images (from the SuperWASP instrument) of the 19.2$^\circ$E geostationary Astras satellite constellation over 5 nights to form light curves and predict model and movement parameters of the satellites.…
The idea behind FIRST (Fibered Imager foR a Single Telescope) is to use single-mode fibers to combine multiple apertures in a pupil plane as such as to synthesize a bigger aperture. The advantages with respect to a pure imager are i)…
We present the detector performance and early science results from GRBAlpha, a 1U CubeSat mission, which is a technological pathfinder to a future constellation of nanosatellites monitoring gamma-ray bursts (GRBs). GRBAlpha was launched in…
Hard X-ray observations with the Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory Burst Alert Telescope (BAT) reveal superorbital modulation in the wind-accreting supergiant high-mass X-ray binary (HMXB) 4U 1538-52 at a period of 14.9130 +/- 0.0026 days that…
This paper presents a system-level engineering approach for the preliminary coverage performance analysis and the design of a generic Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) constellation. This analysis accounts for both the coverage…
The ability to coherently transport electron-spin states between different sites of gate-defined semiconductor quantum dots is an essential ingredient for a quantum-dot-based quantum computer. Previous shuttles using electrostatic gating…
We have performed a Discrete Fourier Transform on 136 CCD B, V and R frames of the Z Cam-type dwarf nova V1101 Aql. Our analysis indicates as possible orbital period P_orb =3.46 hours, though we cannot exclude the alias at 4.00 hours. We…
Laser ablation of a Near-Earth Object (NEO) on a collision course with Earth produces a cloud of ejecta which exerts a thrust on the NEO, deflecting it from its original trajectory. Ablation may be performed from afar by illuminating an…
Leveraging advancements in micro-scale technology, we propose a fleet of autonomous, low-cost, small solar sails for interplanetary exploration. The Berkeley Low-cost Interplanetary Solar Sail (BLISS) project aims to utilize small-scale…
The solar magnetic activity cycle is responsible for periodic episodes of severe space weather, which can perturb satellite orbits, interfere with communications systems, and bring down power grids. Much progress has recently been made in…