A low cost thermal infrared hyperspectral imager for small satellites

2011 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. T. Crites ◽  
P. G. Lucey ◽  
R. Wright ◽  
H. Garbeil ◽  
K. A. Horton
Keyword(s):  
Low Cost ◽  
Thermal Infrared ◽  
Small Satellites

A low cost thermal infrared hyperspectral imager for small satellites

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. T. Crites ◽  
P. G. Lucey ◽  
R. Wright ◽  
H. Garbeil ◽  
K. A. Horton ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Low Cost ◽  
Thermal Infrared ◽  
Small Satellites

A Multimodule Planar Air Bearing Testbed for CubeSat-Scale Spacecraft

2013 ◽  
Vol 135 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
William R. Wilson ◽  
Laura L. Jones ◽  
Mason A. Peck
Keyword(s):  
Multibody Dynamics ◽  
Technology Development ◽  
Low Cost ◽  
Air Bearing ◽  
Cost Performance ◽  
Small Satellites ◽  
Ground Testing ◽  
Spacecraft Mission ◽  
Cost Scaling ◽  
Design Cost

In the past several years, small satellites have taken on an increasingly important role as affordable technology demonstrators and are now being viewed as viable low-cost platforms for traditional spacecraft mission objectives. As such, the CubeSat standard (1 kg in a 10 cm cube) has been widely adopted for university-led development efforts even as it is embraced by traditional spacecraft developers, such as NASA. As CubeSats begin to take on roles traditionally filled by much larger spacecraft, the infrastructure for dynamics and controls testing must also transition to accommodate the different size and cost scaling associated with CubeSats. While air-bearing-based testbeds are commonly used to enable a variety of traditional ground testing and development for spacecraft, few existing designs are suitable for development of CubeSat-scale technologies, particularly involving multibody dynamics. This work describes Cornell University's FloatCube testbed, which provides a planar reduced-friction environment for multibody dynamics and controls technology development for spacecraft less than 6 kg and a 15 cm cube. The multimodule testbed consists of four free-floating air-bearing platforms with on-board gas supplies that allow the platforms to float over a glass surface without external attachments. Each of these platforms, or FloatCubes, can host CubeSat-sized payloads at widely ranging levels of development, from prototype components to full-scale systems. The FloatCube testbed has already hosted several successful experiments, proving its ability to provide an affordable reduced-friction environment to CubeSat-scale projects. This paper provides information on the system design, cost, performance, operating procedures, and applications of this unique, and increasingly relevant, testbed.

scholarly journals Guidance Stabilization of Satellites Using the Geomagnetic Field

2012 ◽  
Vol 2012 ◽  
pp. 1-9
Author(s):  
Francisco Miranda
Keyword(s):  
Geomagnetic Field ◽  
Technological Development ◽  
Low Cost ◽  
Low Earth Orbit ◽  
Earth Orbit ◽  
Small Satellites ◽  
Attitude Stabilization ◽  
Short Period ◽  
Low Earth Orbit Satellite ◽  
Games Theory

In the last years the small satellites have played an important role in the technological development. The attractive short period of design and low cost of them and the capacity to solve problems that are usually considered as problems to big and expensive spacecrafts lead us to study the control problem of these satellites. Active three-axis magnetic attitude stabilization of a low Earth orbit satellite is considered in this work. The control is created by interaction between the magnetic moment generated by magnetorquers mounted on the satellite body and the geomagnetic field. This problem is quite complex and difficult to solve. To overcome this difficulty guidance control is considered, where we use ε-strategies introduced by Pontryagin in the frame of differential games theory. Qualitative analysis and results of numerical simulation are presented.

Pehuensat-1

2013 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 47-77
Author(s):  
Juan Jorge Quiroga ◽  
Jorge Lassig ◽  
Darío Mendieta
Keyword(s):  
Low Cost ◽  
Flight Test ◽  
Space Missions ◽  
Space Science ◽  
Research Groups ◽  
Small Satellites ◽  
Microelectronic Technology ◽  
Scientific Experiments

Nowadays, it is possible to achieve low cost and short production times space missions using satellites with a mass below 10 kg. These small satellites are described as nanosatellites. Current microelectronic technology makes it possible to develop nanosatellites for scientific experiments and relatively complex measurements (as well as for other applications), making it easy for universities and small research groups to have access to space science exploration and to exploit the new economic possibilities that emerge. This paper describes an experiment developed in Argentina at the Universidad Nacional del Comahue to design, construct and flight test a nanosatellite called Pehuensat-1. Finally is presented to Pehuensat-2 as future commercial nano-satellite.

scholarly journals A Second-Iteration Square Koch Fractal Slot Antenna for UHF Downlink Telemetry Applications in CubeSat Small Satellites

2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 ◽  
pp. 1-10
Author(s):  
Jorge Simon ◽  
Jorge Flores-Troncoso ◽  
Jose Luis Alvarez-Flores ◽  
Leonel Soriano-Equigua ◽  
Marco Cardenas-Juarez ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Reflection Coefficient ◽  
Fractal Geometry ◽  
Low Cost ◽  
Economic Cost ◽  
Slot Antenna ◽  
Limited Area ◽  
Cost Difference ◽  
Small Satellites ◽  
Koch Fractal ◽  
Uhf Band

This article presents the design, fabrication, and measurement of a square Koch fractal slot antenna for UHF band using both the FR4-G10 and Cuclad 250 substrates. Conveniently, this 56.56 cm full-length antenna possesses a geometry that allows it to be incorporated into the standardized 10 cm × 10 cm faces of the CubeSats. Furthermore, it is shown that both selected substrates exhibit an acceptable performance at the frequency of interest despite the economic cost difference and relative permittivity. Hence, the commercial FR4-G10 antenna substrate can be preferred because of its low-cost and admissible performance at 458 MHz, which is a frequency in the UHF band that is commonly used for telemetry, tracking, and command downlinks of CubeSats. Measurements show that the proposed antenna exhibits a reflection coefficient of −16.53 dB, a bandwidth of 22.62 MHz at −10 dB, a VSWR of 1.3508, a normalized impedance of 0.794 − j0.173 at 50 Ω, and a directivity of 2.24 dBi. The contribution of this work consists in the use of a fractal geometry to construct a low-cost slot antenna working at UHF frequencies over the limited area of the CubeSat faces and in order to optimize the area for an eventual coexistence with solar cells.

Methods of Mass-Flow Characterization of Water-Glycol Mixtures Through Micro/Nano-Channels

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Lee ◽  
Po-Hao Huang
Keyword(s):  
Mass Flow ◽  
Low Cost ◽  
Thermal Characteristics ◽  
Propulsion System ◽  
Optical Tracking ◽  
Gaseous State ◽  
Small Satellites ◽  
Class 1 ◽  
Nano Channel ◽  
Micro Propulsion

The design of a novel micro-propulsion system for small satellites of the nano-satellites class (1–10kg) that is low-cost, non-toxic, non-flammable, and no-pressurized at launch conditions is currently being developed at the University of Arkansas. The goal of the present micro-propulsion system is to achieve milli-Newton thrust levels with specific impulses on the order of 100s. The proposed propellant is the water-propylene glycol. However, little data is available for its fluid and thermal characteristics at the gaseous state, nor the evolution of similar mixtures through micro/nano-channels. This paper will present experimental methods of measuring the mass flow rate of the water-glycol mixtures through micro/nano-channels. A MEMS fluidic chamber fabricated with a nano-channel is used to quantify the mass flow through optical tracking of liquid interfaces confined in the chamber. The dimensions of the channels are designed with the purpose to act as a passive throttling valve that prevent liquid-phase fluids from entering into the nozzle in order to achieve a simple water-based cold-gas propulsion system.

scholarly journals Three-Dimensional Thermal Mapping from IRT Images for Rapid Architectural Heritage NDT

Buildings ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (10) ◽  
pp. 187
Author(s):  
Efstathios Adamopoulos ◽  
Monica Volinia ◽  
Mario Girotto ◽  
Fulvio Rinaudo
Keyword(s):  
Optical Sensors ◽  
Infrared Imaging ◽  
Low Cost ◽  
Three Dimensional ◽  
Cost Effective ◽  
Thermal Infrared ◽  
Architectural Heritage ◽  
Thermal Camera ◽  
Historical Building ◽  
Custom Made

Thermal infrared imaging is fundamental to architectural heritage non-destructive diagnostics. However, thermal sensors’ low spatial resolution allows capturing only very localized phenomena. At the same time, thermal images are commonly collected with independence of geometry, meaning that no measurements can be performed on them. Occasionally, these issues have been solved with various approaches integrating multi-sensor instrumentation, resulting in high costs and computational times. The presented work aims at tackling these problems by proposing a workflow for cost-effective three-dimensional thermographic modeling using a thermal camera and a consumer-grade RGB camera. The discussed approach exploits the RGB spectrum images captured with the optical sensor of the thermal camera and image-based multi-view stereo techniques to reconstruct architectural features’ geometry. The thermal and optical sensors are calibrated employing custom-made low-cost targets. Subsequently, the necessary geometric transformations between undistorted thermal infrared and optical images are calculated to replace them in the photogrammetric scene and map the models with thermal texture. The method’s metric accuracy is evaluated by conducting comparisons with different sensors and the efficiency by assessing how the results can assist the better interpretation of the present thermal phenomena. The conducted application demonstrates the metric and radiometric performance of the proposed approach and the straightforward implementability for thermographic surveys, as well as its usefulness for cost-effective historical building assessments.

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