Digital Commons Network^™

University Ground-Station-As-A-Service: Promoting Space It Education And University Collaboration, Daniel Freburg, Will Lewis, Charles Edamala, Phoenix Alpine

Small Satellite Conference

Poster presented at the 2026 Small Satellite Conference

Zerodur®: Tailoring Opportunities For Your Thermal Environment And Second-Order Optimum Factors, Jesse Bonfeld, Dustin Ruth, Florian Gollier, Janina Krieg, Thomas Westerhoff, Tony Hull, Jacqueline Caraballo

Small Satellite Conference

Poster Presented at the 2026 Small Satellite Conference

Development Of Wavelength-Division-Multiplexed All-Optical Relays For Low-Earth Orbit Free-Space Optical Communication Networks, Travis Jones, Justin Cook, Chris Krush, Doruk Engin, Keith G. Petrillo

Small Satellite Conference

In this work, we designed, built, and tested an all-optical relay amplifier to enable a space-based all-optical backbone for laser communications networks. The design sought to optimize links for LEO-based networks incorporating appropriate span lengths and optical terminal specifications. We incorporate an add-drop multiplexer for rerouting signals and designed the system to be flexible over span lengths with a nominal range of 1,800 km. We performed several tests of the nominally 60 dB gain amplifier to assess link dynamics unique to free space optical communications (FSOC) including the impact of pointing jitter, nonlinearities, gain flattening, and wide-band filters on an …

Sailing To The Stars Iss Experiment: Results And Conclusions From Light Sail Deployments In Microgravity, Verena Padres, Parishee Bajaj, Venkata Chalamalasetty, Claire Kim, Joshua Umansky-Castro, Dionna Parina, Gabriella Elcsics-Gonzalez, Cameron Goddard, Ethan Francolla, Mason Peck, Andrew Filo, Alex Burke, Olivia Gámez Holzhaus, Heath Mills, Christopher Kelly

Small Satellite Conference

Sailing to the Stars is a mission to test the deployment of free-flying light sails on the International Space Station (ISS). The objective is to understand how different deployer designs affect the stability of both the CubeSat Deployer and the light sail during and after the deployment event. Data from the IMU onboard the deployer and video footage from wall-mounted cameras are used to analyze these dynamics. The findings shall inform the design of future missions that employ this free-flying ChipSat-sail architecture.

The hardware launched with Crew-11 on August 1^st, 2025. Nicole Ayers conducted the experiment on August …

A Proposed Development Process For A Hardware-In-The-Loop Testing System For Cubesat Components, Vahini N. Patel, Victoria Coverstone

Small Satellite Conference

Hardware-in-the-loop testing systems, commonly known as FlatSats, are testbed systems in which spacecraft subsystems, such as the onboard computer (OBC), power system, attitude determination and control system (ADCS), and communications, are laid flat and interconnected as they would be in an actual spacecraft. This arrangement gives easy access to each subsystem, enabling hardware and software testing and troubleshooting without risking fully assembled flight hardware.

FlatSats are widely used throughout the aerospace industry, from government agencies like ESA and NASA to private companies and university research labs, due to their versatility in enabling parallel development. This accelerates timelines and reduces …

Herding Cubecats: Challenges And Lessons Learned From A Student-Led Cubesat Organization, Matthew Verbryke, Samuel Kohls, Nathan Nguyen, Michael Carovillano, Donghoon Kim

Small Satellite Conference

1. What is CubeCats?

CubeCats is a student-led technical engineering organization founded in 2015 at the University of Cincinnati (UC) with the mission of providing its members with hands-on, educational experience in space systems engineering, primarily through the design, development, testing, launch, and operation of flight-worthy CubeSats and High Altitude Balloons.

CubeCats’ operating model differs significantly from many university-based satellite programs:

• The organization is entirely managed and run by students, the majority of whom are undergraduates (UC faculty and staff serve primarily in an advisory role)
• The organization is entirely volunteer-based, with no direct integration into coursework or on-campus research …

A Cubesat-Based Data Collection Architecture For The Catarina Constellation: Complementing Legacy Brazilian Data Collection System With Lora, Vitória Beatriz Bianchin, Carlos Augusto Porto Freitas, João Cláudio Elsen Barcellos, Gabriel Mariano Marcelino, Talita Sauter Possamai, Eduardo Augusto Bezerra

Small Satellite Conference

• The Catarina Constellation is a Brazilian CubeSat initiative created to enhance environmental monitoring and satellite-based environmental data collection across Brazil.
• The project was named after Hurricane Catarina (2004), the first recorded hurricane in the South Atlantic, which exposed the need for improved space-based monitoring of extreme weather events.
• The constellation aims to expand the Brazilian Satellite Data Collection System (SBCD) by evaluating new communication technologies, enabling a gradual modernization of the country’s environmental monitoring infrastructure.

Helio: Ai Solar Weather Forecasting For Proactive Small Satellite Constellation Response, Kylie Nager, James Kirk, Cagri Kilic

Small Satellite Conference

Challenge:

Small satellite constellations in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) operate in an environment directly exposed to space weather while providing communications, remote sensing, positioning, and other critical services. Geomagnetic storms heat and expand the thermosphere, increasing neutral density, atmospheric drag, and orbital decay. These effects are especially hazardous during post-deployment and orbit-raising operations when satellites remain at low altitude with limited propulsion and recovery margins.

Operational Gap:

NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center products provide essential situational awareness, but satellite operators must still translate environmental forecasts into spacecraft-specific decisions. This translation can introduce operational delay particularly when protective actions must be …

Comparison Of Cubesat And Pocketqube Mission Timelines And Costs, Benjamin Skinner, Brian Damitz, Nathan Ford, Brian Iverson, David Long

Small Satellite Conference

PocketQube missions promise to reduce costs, speed up development timelines, and increase pedagogical value. We compared this mission format to CubeSat mission to compare relative strengths and weaknesses.

Development Of Low-Cost And Mobile University Ground Stations, Michael Cargill, Matthew Watson, Patrick Bailey, Jacob Boutin, Wout De Backer

Small Satellite Conference

Recent years have seen a deluge of university-class small satellite missions, driving an increase in demand for ground stations. SatNOGS is an open-source network of ground stations allowing users to schedule observations on each others’ hardware. Most stations are fixed in-place. Mobile stations lack endurance or are high cost. There is a gap for a low-cost option for groups needing mobility.

Solar-Assisted Battery Charging For The Chipsat Architecture: Chipsat Updates And Validation For The Descent Mission, Mark Lohatepanont, Joshua Umansky-Castro, Val Zeitlin, Matthew Hurford, Mason Peck, Andrew Filo, Alex Burke

Small Satellite Conference

DeSCENT is a suborbital mission to deploy 100 ChipSats from Blue Origin's New Shepard near 100 km altitude. The experiment characterizes ChipSat free-fall kinematics and dispersion, and demonstrates their potential for distributed atmospheric sensing. The updated ChipSat combines rechargeable energy storage and body-mounted solar cells with GPS, sensing, onboard logging, and 915 MHz LoRa communications. Lab testing and high-altitude balloon flights validate integrated power operation and long-range communications performance. Preliminary mechanical testing supports the remaining deployment and flight-verification effort.

Thermal Analysis Of Small Satellites, Devansh Patel

Small Satellite Conference

Accurate thermal modeling is essential to spacecraft design, ensuring components remain within operational temperatures throughout orbit. This study develops and validates thermal models of increasing complexity to gain practical experience in spacecraft thermal analysis.

The GRIFEX mission is a 3U CubeSat launched in a 634 km circular polar orbit by the Michigan Exploration Laboratory (MXL). The CubeSat observed both 90° and 0° beta angle orbits during its mission, making it optimal for comparing thermal analysis results for small satellites in low Earth orbit.

Toward Plug-And-Play Sensor Integration: A Multi-Protocol Hardware Bridge For Nanosatellites, Pawan Kumar, Moritz P. Heimbach, Shayarrn Khatiwada, Jiten Thapa, Marco Schmidt

Small Satellite Conference

COTS sensors speak many protocols; but the satellite bus understands only a few. An FPGA hardware bridge board reroutes heterogeneous sensor protocols (UART, SPI, RS-422, RS-485) to the single communication channel with minimum latency supporting plug-and-play with no bus redesign.

Software For The Alpha Cubesat Mission: System Architecture, Development, And Testing Behind Successful Flight Operations, Eric Zhang, Jonathan Ma, Joshua Umansky-Castro, Lauren Greenhill, Duncan Mcdonald, Damian Hackett, Maria Boza, Cameron Goddard

Small Satellite Conference

Alpha CubeSat is a 1U CubeSat designed, built, and operated by a student-led team at Cornell University. Its primary mission is to deploy a free-flying lightsail in low Earth orbit, carrying gram-scale "ChipSat" flight computers as a demonstration of low-cost distributed sensing in space. The spacecraft was built around commercial, off-the-shelf hardware, including a Teensy 3.5 microcontroller as the primary flight computer and a RockBLOCK Iridium modem for communication, and was developed and flown under the constraints that define a student program: a small power budget, a rotating team, limited development time, and an intermittent operations radio link. The CubeSat …

Lighting Up The Moon: A Scheduling Framework For Cislunar Space Based Solar Power Orchestration, Vaibhav Bhosale, Andrew Woo, Ada Gavrilovska, Christopher R. Valenta, Ketan Bhardwaj

Small Satellite Conference

Surviving the Lunar Night

• 14 Earth day lunar nights
• More batteries, more mass, higher cost

Sierasat: A 6u Cubesat Platform For Space-Based Solar Power, Sutharsan Indrakumar, Ahmed Guller, Leann Cwieka, Justin Parry, Minh Nguyen, Kaegan Lucas, Carson Bove, Chaitra Nulu, Myles Thomas, Sophia Jones, Deepak R. Mishra

Small Satellite Conference

Reliance on fossil fuels, combined with the physical limits of ground-based solar arrays, makes a strong case for collecting solar energy in orbit. Earth intercepts roughly 1.4 kW/m² at the top of the atmosphere, but absorption by carbon dioxide and water vapour and atmospheric scattering cut peak surface intensity to about 1.1 kW/m², this results in an over a 20% reduction. While inclination, time of day, and weather restrict that to a narrow band of land for a few hours each day.

The Solar Incident Energy Relay Array (SIERA) is a proposed mission that will create a single 6U CubeSat …

Spatial Reconstructability Analysis: Information-Theoretic Modeling Of Categorical Raster Data, David Percy

Dissertations and Theses

This research focuses on the application of Reconstructability Analysis (RA), an information-theoretic machine learning (ML) methodology, to categorical spatial data in Geographic Information Systems (GIS). RA was developed in the systems community with applications including classification, prediction, pattern recognition, and decision analysis. RA is implemented in OCCAM (Organizational Complexity Computation and Modeling), a software suite developed at Portland State University that analyzes discrete data in tabular form, with observations in rows and variables in columns. While RA has been successfully applied to a variety of domains, no systematic application to georeferenced raster data arranged in regular grids has been previously …

Toward Trainable Ai Agents For Satellite Operations, Haley Calderon, Vaibhav Bhosale, Ketan Bhardwaj, Ada Gavrilovska

Small Satellite Conference

Low Earth orbit is increasingly crowded, and a growing share of it is flown by universities and small operators. These teams must detect and respond to on-orbit anomalies with far less staff, expertise, and tooling than large operators, and a single missed anomaly can end a mission. We present COMET, a ground-based operator agent that helps a small team both detect anomalies and diagnose them. COMET pairs a learned detector with a retrieval-augmented diagnosis stage. An LSTM autoencoder flags anomalous telemetry windows, and a language model explains each one against the mission’s own documentation, procedures, and prior operational records. Because …

Pulse-Q: Space-To-Ground Quantum Key Distribution At The Cubesat Form Factor, Logan Hanssler, Stewart Kristiansen, Ellisian King, Neha Chandran, Unnathi Venkatesh, Selina Gao, Nelson Chan, Mika Sadikario, Joseph Sorel, Lexi Liu, Eleanor Gentry, Rohan Gupta, Juan Ignacio Prieto Asbun, Lauren Ayala, Vincent Redwine, Tian Zhong

Small Satellite Conference

Motivation 

• Quantum key distribution (QKD) offers provably secure communication regardless of the technology available to potential eavesdroppers.
• Space-to-ground QKD facilitates long-distance key distribution without costly terrestrial infrastructure.
• The Polarization-modUlated Laser Satellite Experiment – Quantum (PULSE-Q) is a 12U CubeSat mission to leverage recent innovations in compact quantum sources and optical communication to achieve space-to-ground QKD.

Onboard Ai At The Orbital Edge: A Mission Debrief From Stp-H7-Caspr, Evan W. Gretok, Linus Silbernagel, Diego Wildenstein, Michael J. Cannizzaro, Seth Roffe, Alan D. George

Small Satellite Conference

Goals: Enable autonomous Earth observation and onboard sensor data processing with novel compute

Motivations: Growing numbers of spacecraft demand autonomy in operation and data collection

Challenges: Harsh radiation and thermal environment of space over four-year mission lifetime

A Comparative Analysis Of Radio Frequency And Optical Inter-Satellite Link Communications For Leo Mega-Constellations, Alexa Houck, Suryansh Aryan, Kevin Schroeder, Samantha Kenyon

Small Satellite Conference

SpaceNet design  

Software-based testbed for simulating large satellite networks, specifically LEO-based constellations to analyze network behavior, connectivity, routing, and overall communication.  

• Phase one focuses on connectivity and routing: Given the topology and link availability over time, how does my network behave? 
• Phase two focuses on network emulation: Given the topology and link availability over time, how does my network behave? 

In-Transit Debris Remediation: Dual-Use Logistics For Sustainable Cislunar Smallsat Constellations, Wanjiku Chebet Kanjumba

Small Satellite Conference

A Debris Crisis Meets A Logistics Boom: Low- and high-Earth orbit keep accumulating debris faster than the atmosphere can clear it, even as NASA's Artemis and CLPS programs establish routine trans-lunar traffic. The 2009 Iridium-Cosmos collision and later anti-satellite tests proved that single fragmentation events can irreversibly degrade critical orbital shells, raising the specter of Kessler Syndrome. 

• 46,600+ objects tracked on orbit today, with ~130 million sub-cm fragments (ESA, 2025)
• $500K-$2M cost per kilogram for dedicated ADR, fiscally intractable at system scale
• 5-10 / yr large objects must be removed to stabilize LEO (Liou & Johnson)

The Unit-Economics Problem: Purpose-built …

Aggiesat6 University Cubesat Ops Prep And Leops, Avery G. Barriga, Garrett M. Stevenson, John F. Connolly

Small Satellite Conference

AggieSat6 (AGS6) is a 6U CubeSat designed and developed by students at Texas A&M University (TAMU) as part of the University Nanosatellite Program (UNP) NS-10 cycle. The mission will demonstrate a space-based radio frequency array for Space Domain Awareness (SDA) applications and collect low-energy electron radiation data to improve existing environmental models. Beginning in January 2025, students at TAMU established mission operations architecture, implemented operator training and certification, and prepared to assume sole responsibility for on-orbit operations. The AggieSat6 bus launched into Low Earth Orbit (LEO) in April of 2026. The AGS6 Mission was supported by the University Nanosatellite Program. …

Implementation Of 4-Ir In Scm Of Woven Apparel Industry – A Case Study In Bangladesh For Prosperity And Sustainability, Kaniz Farhana, Nazibah Nowreen Onadee, Farhana Mabia Mim, Fuzail Ahmed Khan Rajit, Md. Fahad Faruk Pavel, S.M. Farhana Iqbal, Abu Shadate Faisal Mahamude

The Nexus of Sustainability and Energy Technology Journal

The significance of the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4-IR) for supply chain management (SCM) in the woven clothing industry is emphasized by this survey study. The implementation of cutting-edge technologies that can improve these aspects, like IoT, RFID, blockchain, big data analysis, cybersecurity, and automation, is examined from the viewpoints of woven clothing manufacturers. This investigation seeks to determine Bangladesh's key technological barriers as well as the primary motivator for the weaving RMG's adoption of cutting-edge technologies. Here, a combination of methods, including fieldwork and data collection, has been performed for thorough analysis. The research outlines the current state of affairs …

Evaluation Of Graphene Cathode And Aluminum Ion Ev Battery Performance: A State-Of-The-Art Analysis For Future, Abu Shadate Faisal Mahamude, Kaniz Farhana

The Nexus of Sustainability and Energy Technology Journal

Lithium-ion batteries may eventually be replaced with rechargeable aluminum-ion batteries (AIBs) due to their high energy density, increased safety, and plentiful supply of raw materials. The development of appropriate cathode materials for AIBs is a major priority these days. As a result of their better quality, graphene-based cathodes have a great chance of success. Graphene is a relatively new and promising material with a unique set of chemical and physical characteristics. Graphene's high electron conductivity and large specific surface area make it seem like one of the best electron-conducting additions, but there are several other ways to increase the cathode …

Field-Like- And Self-Spin-Orbit Torques In Magnetic Multilayer Films, Kyle Jeffrey Peterson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Spin-orbit torques (SOTs) have been realized as an energy efficient mechanism to manipulate and drive magnetization dynamics in magnetic multilayer films. Their damping-like and field-like components provide distinct pathways for controlling the magnetization, enabling switching, sustaining magneto-oscillations, and driving domain-wall motion with potential applications in nonvolatile memory, spin-based logic, and microwave signal generation. However, the accurate quantification and interpretation of these torques remains complicated by experimental sensitivity, the co-symmetry of the Oersted field and the effective field due to the field-like torque, and assumptions regarding the material layers from which the torques originate. The body of work set forth in …

Techno-Economic Analysis Of The Utilization Of Waste-To-Energy In Jakarta Industrial Estate Pulogadung, Wahyu Punjung Pesonagrata, Mohammad Akita Indianto

Journal of Materials Exploration and Findings

Indonesia has a serious waste problem, which ranking second in marine pollution. Due to significant environmental impacts, a solution to overcome the complexity of waste problems is needed. This study took sample on waste management in Jakarta Industrial Estate Pulogadung (JIEP). JIEP is an Industrial area which covers 443 hectares of land in East Jakarta. This study aims to address Indonesia's serious waste problem by exploring the potential utilization of waste in the Jakarta Industrial Estate Pulogadung (JIEP) as Refuse-Derived Fuel (RDF) for a waste-to-energy (WtE) power plant. The proposed method used a steam power plant with RDF as fuel …

Novel Uncrewed Aircraft Water Sampling Device, Justin Fratto, Avinash Muthu Krishnan, Kayla D. Taylor, David Zink, Marc Compere, Kevin Adkins

Discovery Day - Daytona Beach

Supported by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), this project’s objective is to create a novel simultaneous surface and discrete depth water sampler for use with an uncrewed aircraft, something which has not been done before. The device will be used to improve the spatiotemporal resolution of harmful algal bloom (HAB) monitoring on Lake Okeechobee in South Florida to provide timely and precise information on water quality and HABs. HABs are characterized by the EPA as certain species of algae that can produce harmful toxins and produce excessive blooms or growth in certain conditions. Often occurring in warmer months due to …

Pathways And Strategies For Intelligent Economy To Drive High-Quality Development, Yiming Wang

Bulletin of Chinese Academy of Sciences (Chinese Version)

The intelligent economy is a new economic model driven by artificial intelligence, representing a revolutionary shift in the technological-economic paradigm that promotes qualitative advancement in production factors, production functions, and production models. Through data-driven approaches, human-machine collaboration, cross-sector integration, and co-creation and sharing, the intelligent economy empowers high-quality development. In response to the transformations brought by the intelligent economy in terms of technology, factors, industries, ecosystems, and governance, systematic measures should be taken across scientific innovation, factor allocation, industrial transformation, ecosystem building, and governance systems to foster the emergence of new forms of the intelligent economy and inject strong momentum …

Theoretical Analysis And Promotion Path Of Coordinated Digital-Intelligent And Green Transformation In Manufacturing Industry, Chaokai Xue, Xiaohui Qu, Laijun Wang, Yifan Yang

Bulletin of Chinese Academy of Sciences (Chinese Version)

The coordinated digital-intelligent and green transformation in the manufacturing industry serves as a key lever for accelerating the sector’s progress towards intelligence, greenization, and integration. This study defines the connotation and key characteristics of the coordinated digital-intelligent and green transformation, constructs a theoretical analysis framework, identifies its current status and challenges, and proposes a promotion pathway based on above work. Drawing upon theories from digital economics, environmental economics, and industrial economics, this study develops an analytical framework characterized by scenario-driven dynamics, technology-enabled transformation, organizational collaboration, and environmental support. It further proposes actionable pathways, including enhancing scenario supply capacity, accelerating the …