Digital Commons Network^™

Designing Coordinated Multi-Vehicle Networks For Leo-To-Geo Transport Using Low-Thrust Propulsion, Shan Selvamurugan, E. Glenn Lightsey

Small Satellite Conference

Elements of on-orbit servicing (OOS), such as propellant depots and refuellable servicing spacecraft (servicers), offer promising means to extend the operational lifespan of Earth-orbiting assets. While current concepts for reusable in-space transportation often rely on a single, versatile servicer to transfer payload satellites to high-energy orbits, an alternative approach to this monolithic architecture may employ a network of space-resident transport vehicles to move payloads from low-Earth orbit (LEO) to geostationary orbit (GEO). This paper investigates how servicers equipped with low-thrust propulsion can be used to design fuel-optimal, multi-vehicle transport architectures under temporal constraints. A set of analytical solutions is derived …

Leopard: Demonstrating Cubesat Technologies For Light Scattering Observations And Satellite Positioning In Leo For Future University-Based Lunar Missions, Necmi Cihan Orger, Victor Hugo Schulz, Jose Rodrigo Corodova-Alarcon, Hanadi Abdalla, Mehmet Esit, Makiko Kishimoto, Sara Aziz, Mengu Cho, Minh Pham Anh, Hery Steven Mindaro, Subsinchai Ratatamanun, Enkhmend Ochirsukh, Husseinat Etti-Balogun, Kubo Shota, Jeje Kudakwashe, Thibaut Tena, Rafiki Yves Ndayishimiye, Daisuke Nakayama, Alper Sanli, Konosuke Nishinaga, Akihiro Oboshi, Edgar Mujuni, Ramson Munyaradgi Nyamakondiwa, Im Polimey, Hiroto Hidaka, Hirokazu Masui, Josue Reynel Galindo Rosales

Small Satellite Conference

The LEOPARD (Light intensity Experiment with On-orbit Positioning and satellite Ranging Demonstration) satellite is a 3-unit (3U) CubeSat platform to demonstrate several technologies and payloads in low Earth orbit (LEO) prior to future lunar CubeSat missions. After deployment from the International Space Station (ISS), it plans to perform the following missions, including onboard processing of Earth-origin one-way radio ranging signals (OPERA), multispectral imaging to monitor light scattering above the horizon (MSC), single event latch-up detection (SEL), solar panel deployment using shape memory alloy (SMA), and ambient magnetic field measurements. First, the OPERA mission will validate critical steps towards deep-space positioning …

In 8 Years From Design To Launch: Objectives, Challenges And Risk Mitigation Of The Educational Student Cubesat Project Source, Philipp Hoffmann, Kaja Gebhard, Mario Spahr, Klemens Boltenhagen, Michael O'Donohue, Daniel Galla, Robin Schweigert, Natascha Bonidis, Sabine Klinkner

Small Satellite Conference

The Stuttgart Operated University Research CubeSat for Evaluation and Education (SOURCE) project is a 3U+ CubeSat developed in collaboration between the Small Satellite Student Society at the University of Stuttgart (KSat e.V.) and the University of Stuttgart’s Institute of Space Systems. This educational satellite mission is designed to provide students with hands-on experience in all phases of satellite development, from the initial concept to the final mission operations. SOURCE’s development began in 2018 and has been supported by ESA’s Fly Your Satellite! program since 2020. Over the past seven years, more than 500 students have had the opportunity to work …

Target Selection For The Pandora Smallsat: A Nasa Mission To Disentangle Stellar And Exoplanet Atmosphere Signals, Knicole Colón, Elisa Quintana, Thomas Barclay, Benjamin Hord, Jessie Dotson, Daniel Apai, Benjamin Rackham, Jason Rowe

Small Satellite Conference

The Pandora SmallSat mission was selected for implementation in 2021 as part of NASA’s Astrophysics Pioneers Program. Pandora is designed to monitor stellar variability while studying the atmospheres of transiting exoplanets via transmission spectroscopy. The transmission spectroscopy technique is one of the best methods to identify the makeup of exoplanetary atmospheres now and in the coming decade. However, stellar variations that occur from the presence of, for example, cool star spots, have been shown to contaminate the exoplanet atmosphere spectra obtained with high-precision transmission spectroscopy measurements. This stellar contamination leads to ambiguous interpretations when attempting to distinguish features like potential …

Rhok-Sat: Investigating Perovskite Solar Cell Performance And Degradation In Low Earth Orbit Through A 1u Cubesat, José R. Pastrana, Anas Matar, Kerry Tang, Damian Nguyen, Marouf M. Paul, Mallory Miller, Phuc H. Nguyen, Jasper Scherz, Zheng Yu Wong, Jess G. Hamer, Olivia A. Kaufmann, Benjamin T. Wilson, B. Burnham

Small Satellite Conference

RHOK-SAT is a 1U CubeSat scheduled to launch in September 2025 aboard a resupply mission to the International Space Station (ISS) through NASA’s CubeSat Launch Initiative (CSLI) program. Its mission is to characterize the performance and degradation of six experimental perovskite solar cells in low Earth orbit for 12 months. Characterization consists of current-voltage measurement taken by one dedicated microcontroller per solar cell. Measurements are performed when the cells are in direct sunlight, determined via a quadrant photodiode. A silver-alloyed copper indium gallium selenide (ACIGS) solar cell serves as a reference for comparative analysis due to its well-characterized behavior. Each …

Extended Testing Of A Steam-Powered Propulsion System For Rapid-Orbit Corrections: A Viable Alternative To Chemical Propulsion, Marco Pavan, Ivan Timofeev, Vladimir Fedorov, Jinyoung Shin

Small Satellite Conference

The Steam Thruster One is an electro-thermal propulsion system capable of delivering a thrust level up to 20 mN, using 20 W of power and reaching a total impulse of about 1200 Ns in its 2U configuration. The system operates solely on low-pressure water, ensuring complete safety for integration and operations both on the ground and in space. The propulsion cycle involves converting liquid water into superheated steam, which is then expanded through a nozzle to generate thrust.

The propulsion system was tested in space in Q3 2023 and Q2 2024, where it successfully demonstrated short propulsion manoeuvres. However, for …

Stp-H12-Vantage: Combining Visual And Event-Based Sensing For Earth Observation, Diego Wildenstein, Michael J. Cannizzaro, Ian Peitzsch, Linus Silbernagel, Joshua Poravanthattil, Peter Drum, Mark Hofmeister, Cole Bowman, Natan Herzog, Evan W. Gretok, Alan D. George

Small Satellite Conference

Conducting Earth-observation tasks from orbit can provide valuable research insights in fields such as meteorology, geology, forestry, cartography, and defense. Developing and building space payloads for Earth observation poses significant challenges, including the high cost of radiation-tolerant systems, the widening gap between current state-of-the-art apps and the capabilities of space-grade processors, and the increase in fidelity of modern sensors. Many Earth-observation missions typically collect data by leveraging visual and/or multispectral imagers. However, when using conventional imaging, there can be significant losses in context due to the frame-based operation of these sensors, as well as both relevant and irrelevant data mixed …

Machine Learning For Interference Detection And Mitigation On Space Telecom Software-Defined Radio Signals, Adhémar De Senneville, Dennis Ogbe, Zaid Towfic

Small Satellite Conference

Detecting anomalies and interference is an essential capability of contemporary flight radios and ground support equipment. The advent of software-defined radios (SDRs) has made this task feasible. These radios allow real-time monitoring and potential mitigation of interference by adjusting frequency bands. This feature is useful as spacecraft components degrade and interference from other instruments may disrupt communications. The implementation of automated anomaly detection systems on SDRs can enhance both spacecraft and ground station testing by identifying abnormal waveforms and potential interference in communication channels. First, this work investigates how machine learning compares against classical signal processing approaches for the anomaly …

Development Of The Optical Deep-Space Instrument For Navigation (Odin), Rebecca Inman, Riana Pecourt, Ronney Lovelace, Max Marshall, Ava Thrasher, John Christian, William Driessen

Small Satellite Conference

The Optical Deep-space Instrument for Navigation (ODIN) is a customizable, multiple camera, multiple field-of view (FOV) software and hardware sensor package. The instrument and software design are intended to make optical navigation (OpNav) methods more widely available to small satellite missions.

The ODIN flight software will have autonomous functionalities such as target determination, attitude estimation, and horizon-based position estimation, while still offering the option for manual modes to ease mission operation constraints. The flight software is built in core Flight System (cFS) and is designed to be agnostic to camera selection and placement.

Currently, ODIN is in its second year …

Exploring Beamed Energy Propulsion: Development And Application Of A Configurable Simulation Tool, Charles Cundiff, Michael Harrington, Victoria Coverstone, John Larosa

Small Satellite Conference

Laser sailing enables propellantless spacecraft propulsion by transferring momentum from a directed energy beam to a reflective sail. Unlike traditional chemical or electric propulsion systems, laser sails decouple propulsion performance from onboard mass and stored energy, presenting an opportunity for lightweight, scalable spacecraft maneuvering. This work develops and applies a simulation framework in FreeFlyer to evaluate the performance of laser sailing across a range of orbital missions, with emphasis on low-mass systems, such as CubeSats.

The simulation model incorporates several critical physical effects, including beam divergence, atmospheric attenuation, sail material reflectivity and emissivity, thermal loading, and realistic station visibility. The …

Hardening And Advancing Cots Fpga/Gpu Integrated Circuits For The Realization Of Space-Grade System-On-Module, Kwen-Siong Chong, Wei Shu, Joseph S. Chang

Small Satellite Conference

We propose radiation-hardening solutions to mitigate single-event-latchup (SEL) and single-event-upset (SEU) on Commercial-off-the-Shelf (COTS) Field-Programmable-GateArrays (FPGAs) and/or Graphic-Processing-Units (GPUs), advancing COTS FPGAs/GPUs suitable for the realization of spacegrade radiation-tolerant system-on-module (SoM). Our solutions include enhanced power reliability solutions to mitigate SEL, and enhanced data integrity solutions to mitigate SEU. We demonstrate our solutions on an SoM embodying the Xilinx Zync UntraScale+ FPGA, 32GB eMMC, 5 DDR4 memories, and a 32MB QSPI flash. Collectively, on the basis of the (performance × cost) figure-of-merit, our radiation-tolerant SoM is several magnitudes higher than present-art solutions.

Night Sky Brightness Caused By Orbital Reflectors, Erkin Sidick, Ben Nowack, Tristan Semmelhack

Small Satellite Conference

We are in the process of developing a system which redirects the incoming sunlight to a stationary ground target after sunset and before sunrise. One of the purposes is to extend operating hours of solar-farms to after sunset and before sunrise. Our system contributes to light pollution as a by-product. We have developed an optical model to predict the night sky glow caused by the light coming from an orbital reflector. In this paper we will review some work done by others on the night sky brightness caused by artificial city lights first, then present our results of model predictions …

A Dynamic Wireless Channel Emulator For Realistic Cubesat Testing, David Michelson, Eisha Khan, Max Xiang, Yun Xing, Ada Li, Ryan Manak

Small Satellite Conference

Failure of the communication subsystem has been responsible for approximately 20% of small satellite mission failures over the period between 2000 and 2019. Insufficient system-level integration and testing has been cited as one reason why corrective actions weren’t taken before launch to prevent such failures. Here, we introduce a relatively inexpensive GTEM-cell-based dynamic channel emulator that will permit designers of CubeSats operating at frequencies up to 20 GHz to evaluate their spacecraft’s communications over multiple simulated passes with the spacecraft in as close to over-the-air flight condition as possible, including fully deployed antennas. Using this over-the-air channel emulator allows the …

Closed-Loop Satellite Planning And Scheduling For Low-Latency Data Collection And Analysis With A Conversational Agent Interface, Neil Dhingra, Sean Kearns, Nathan Evans, Ella Herz, Armin Rezaiyan-Nojani

Small Satellite Conference

We demonstrate a closed-loop geospatial intelligence (GEOINT) Tasking, Collection, Processing, Exploitation, and Dissemination (TCPED) pipeline that provides data and data analyses using commercial satellite imagery. The Cloudbased Automated Satellite Tactical TCPED (CASTT) software platform obtains data through automated interfaces with satellite operators, performs analyses of that data which drive automated re-tasking by Auria’s optimized collection planning software, and then issues those new follow-up tasks to the satellite operators. Automation shortens the timeline from the receipt of data that warrants follow-up data to its actual collection and delivery. CASTT leverages progress across the space industry to providing an integrated solution drawing …

Revolutionizing Space Thermal Control: The Breakthroughs And Applications Of Pulsating Heat Pipes, Matt Schultz, Jimmy Hughes, Mckenzie Sandberg

Small Satellite Conference

The development of Pulsating Heat Pipes (PHP) offers significant advancements in thermal control technologies. This poster reviews the fundamental mechanisms of PHPs, manufacturing processes, and focuses on how PHPs fit into the current thermal architecture for satellite, payload, and instrument thermal control to identify the best use cases and application of the emerging technology.

Streamlined Calibration For Small Satellite Optical Payloads, Deron Scott, Cole Miller, Eli Shay, Shane Canfield, Scott Hansen, Matt Berghout, Jan Kunzler, Duane Miles

Small Satellite Conference

Poster presented during the 2025 SmallSat Conference.

Novel Pressure-Based Electric Propulsion Discovery, Wesley Faler, Brad Berkson

Small Satellite Conference

This paper presents a novel electric propulsion system that uses pulsed plasma and ion- electron recombination to generate thrust primarily from internal pressure, using water vapor as propellant. In-space testing of the Poseidon^™ thruster demonstrated 37.49 mN average thrust and over 4,800 seconds specific impulse at under 1.5 W input power. A physics-based model captures the full mass, energy, and momentum balances and matches experimental results, supporting pressure as the dominant thrust mechanism. Experimental detection of proton–boron fusion in the exhaust plume further validates the system's plasma behavior and confirms a key element of its operating cycle.

Under-Actuated Target Tracking Performance - Flight Results From The Ghgsat-D Spacecraft, Niels Roth, Benoit Larouche, Robert E. Zee, Stéphane Lokocki, Laura Bradbury, Marcela Arias

Small Satellite Conference

The GHGSat-D spacecraft, a precursor demonstration to GHGSat’s commercial constellation, was launched on June 21 2016 into a polar Sun-synchronous orbit with altitude 507 km and local time of descending node 10:30. The spacecraft successfully demonstrated GHGSat’s novel payload’s ability to measure and monitor precise greenhouse gas emissions from low Earth orbit. Such measurements were enabled by custom target tracking maneuvers allowing its imaging spectrometer to pan across ground targets of interest at prescribed rates. In July 2017 one of its three reaction wheels exhibited signs of high friction, resulting in its discontinued use. With only two functional reaction wheels …

Big Data Solutions For Cubesat Mission Operations: A Case Study From The Michigan Exploration Lab, Daniil Voloshin, James W. Cutler

Small Satellite Conference

As space missions generate increasingly vast and complex datasets, efficient data management and processing solutions are critical. At the Michigan eXploration Lab (MXL) at the University of Michigan, where we design, build, and operate CubeSats, we have adopted big data technologies, specifically a Hadoop and Spark-based cluster, to address challenges in handling and analyzing large-scale data. These challenges include processing raw I/Q sample recordings from CubeSat satellite passes and suborbital missions, as well as mission-long spacecraft telemetry. The cluster leverages the distributed storage capabilities of the Hadoop Distributed File System (HDFS) and the in-memory data processing power of Apache Spark, …

Real-Time Space Weather Event Detection And Attribution Using Fpga-Based Machine Learning On Cubesats, Benjamin Lewis, Shawn Jones, Jonathan Phillips, Charles Swenson, Kade Howes

Small Satellite Conference

Utah State University has been developing hardware accelerators and machine learning algorithms for real-time detection and attribution of space weather events on small satellites. This research, funded under the Low-power Array for CubeSat Edge Computing Architecture, Algorithms, and Applications (LACE-C3A), is a NASA STMD-funded effort as part of the University Smallsat Technology Partnerships (USTP). In this paper, we present an FPGA implementation of an AI/ML algorithm for intelligent decision-making, enabling real-time space weather monitoring and now-casting of Equatorial Plasma Bubbles (EPBs). EPBs are low-density plasma structures that form at low latitudes within the Earth’s ionosphere, rising along magnetic field lines …

A Radio Payload For In-Space Sub-Terahertz Communications, Andrew Benincasa, Sergi Aliaga, Albert Diez-Comas, Josep Miquel Jornet

Small Satellite Conference

This paper presents the first fully integrated design of a CubeSat-compatible sub-terahertz (sub-THz) radio payload for in-space communications at 225 GHz. Addressing the growing congestion in traditional RF bands and the limitations of Free Space Optical systems, the proposed system leverages recent breakthroughs in compact high-frequency front-ends, horn antenna arrays, and RFSoC-based digital processing to unlock multi-GHz bandwidths in the underutilized sub-THz spectrum. A detailed feasibility study confirms link closure from low Earth orbit using state-of-the-art components, and the payload’s architecture is engineered for real-time high-speed uplink/downlink under stringent CubeSat size, weight, and power (SWaP) constraints. The proposed payload will …

Uncoupling Batteries From Eps Design — A Power System For The Modern Era, Andrew E. Kalman

Small Satellite Conference

Space electrical power system (EPS) architectures have often been strongly tied to the voltage of the batteries they employ; the battery operating voltages often dictate the solar cell string lengths and the voltage of the primary buses used for power distribution throughout the spacecraft, as well as internal particulars. This paper presents an alternative space EPS architecture that is independent of battery voltage, and instead, simply treats the connected batteries as a source of power and energy which can be drawn from as desired, and recharged as required. This EPS architecture utilizes a ring bus topology, wherein energy sources feed …

Optical Observation Of Mola Cubesat In Orbit Using Ground Telescope, Jeffrey Larsen, Christine Maceo, Isabella Fernald, Matthew M. Knight, Jim Kang, Michael Sanders, Alex Savattone, Giovanni Minelli, Wenschel Lan

Small Satellite Conference

The proliferation of satellites and satellite constellations in orbit, combined with the rapid expansion of telecommunications and wireless “smart” devices on Earth, has led to congestion in the radio frequency spectrum, adversely affecting data transmission and security. Although technological advances in small satellite technology and new commercial models for rocket launches have lowered the barrier for accessing space, the licensing process to use radio frequencies for satellite communications remains an obstacle. Free Space Optical Communication (FSOC) using the near-infrared and visible parts of the unlicensed optical spectrum offers higher bandwidth, faster data rates, and improved security (near-IR). In 2024, the …

Successful Demonstrations Of The Elroi Satellite License Plate, David M. Palmer, Rebecca M. Holmes Sandoval

Small Satellite Conference

ELROI (Extremely Low Resource Optical Identifier) is a system that attaches a small, cheap, low power, autonomous blinking light to a satellite or other space object to allow it to be unambiguously identified by ground observations using a small telescope. This can provide a resolution to the space object identification problem for future launches at minimal technical and financial costs to the satellite operator. In 2024, two satellites carrying ELROI Space Object Tracking Units were successfully launched on separate rocket launches. As reported here, in both cases ELROI provided the first definitive identification of each satellite, sooner than achieved by …

Vision-Based Dynamic Tasking For Earth-Observing Satellite Constellations, Shreeyam Kacker, Kerri Cahoy, Kiruthika Devaraj, Işıl Demir, Steve Chien

Small Satellite Conference

Unpredictable phenomena such as cloud coverage pose a challenge for conventional Earth observation. Long lead times can cause conditions to change between forecasting, scheduling, and image capture, leading to suboptimal observations. To combat this, dynamic tasking has been proposed as a mission concept, where perception and autonomy are moved onboard the spacecraft in order to quickly respond to changes in the spacecraft’s imaging schedule, leveraging the compute power available in modern Earth-observing spacecraft. In this work, we explore the use of a wide field-of-view body-fixed lookahead sensor, separate from the main imaging payload, to evaluate the real-time utility of upcoming …

Scope-1: On-Orbit Surface Feature-Based Navigation And Timing Mission Overview, Paula Delfin, Lance Lui, Margaret Lambert, Dominic Nguyen, Meenakshi Kalinathabotla, Dylan Mcintyre, Maximilian Roccioli, Riley Vazquez, Yan Zhe Wong, Yulia Meza, Brandon Jones, Renato Zanetti

Small Satellite Conference

The SpaceCraft for Optical-based Position Estimation-1 (SCOPE-1) is a 3U CubeSat developed by the Texas Spacecraft Laboratory (TSL) at The University of Texas at Austin to demonstrate near real-time Position, Navigation, and Timing (PNT) estimation primarily using optical detections of Earth’s islands and archipelagos. The mission adapts algorithms originally developed for lunar crater-based PNT and applies them to terrestrial features for validation in low Earth orbit (LEO). SCOPE-1 features an onboard system combining Mask R-CNN-based surface-feature detection, catalog-based feature identification, and an extended Kalman filter (EKF) to estimate position and timing in near real-time. The SCOPE-1 spacecraft will be built …

Orpheus: A Uk-Led Space Mission To Characterize The Space Domain And Advance Future Concepts For Defense, Kit Grange, Alexander Agathanggelou, Gemma Attrill, Alex Gannon, Christine Mccullough, Graham Routledge, Andy Wells, Andrew Nicholas, Bruce Fritz, Daniel A. Lavigne, Robert Boucher

Small Satellite Conference

The ORPHEUS mission is a collaborative research mission between the UK Defence Science Technology Laboratory (Dstl), the US Naval Research Laboratory (NRL), and the Canadian Defence Research and Development Canada (DRDC) to characterise the space domain and advance future concepts for defence.

The ORPHEUS mission comprises two CubeSats flying in a lead-trail configuration in a near-polar low earth orbit and aims to launch in 2027. This is a follow-on mission to the Coordinated Ionospheric Reconstruction Cubesat Experiment (CIRCE) and Prometheus-2 CubeSat missions that were lost due to a launch failure at the start of 2023, combining and updating the payload …

Escape, Plasma And Acceleration Dynamics Explorers (Escapade) – Enabling A Low-Cost Mars Mission, Jeffrey S. Parker, Andrew Kohler, Mitchell Rosen, Lauren De Moudt, Robert Lillis, David Curtis, Ellen Taylor, Sasha Courtade, Daniel Cosgrove, Christophe Mandy, Antoine Bichara

Small Satellite Conference

The Escape, Plasma and Acceleration Dynamics Explorers (ESCAPADE) mission will provide a comprehensive picture of how solar wind energy flows through Mars’ unique hybrid magnetosphere to drive ion and sputtering escape. The mission has undergone several transformations to accommodate evolving launch constraints, highlighting its resilience and offering valuable insights for designing low-cost, adaptable Mars missions. This paper describes why and how ESCAPADE has pivoted, how the mission design accommodated the change, and what lessons have been learned. The objective is to illuminate how to design launch resiliency into a low-cost Mars mission.

Acmes: The Next-Generation Of Advanced Lwir Observations Of The Earth, Lucas Anderson, Michael Kirk, Chad Fish, Bruno Mattos, Charles Swenson, Miguel Nunes, Robert Wright

Small Satellite Conference

The Active Cooling for Multispectral Earth Sensors (ACMES) program is an advanced Long-Wave IR (LWIR) remote observation Earth Science Small Satellite mission scheduled to launch in 2026 to a high-inclination 550 km Sun synchronous (SSO) orbit. ACMES will host several novel payloads and technologies, including the Hyperspectral Thermal Imager 2.0 (HyTI 2.0), the Filter Incidence Narrowband Infrared Spectrometer (FINIS), the Planar Langmuir Impedance Diagnostic (PLAID) probe, and the Active Thermal Architecture (ATA) system. ACMES will serve a one-year primary mission focused on technology demonstration, followed by a three-year science-based mission to provide valuable LWIR observations of the Earth’s surface. The …

Deploying And Operating The 25-Satellite Kinéis Constellation, Challenges And Lessons Learned, Franck Darnon, Anissa Bahri, Silvia Salas, Isabelle Hernandez, Damien Servant

Small Satellite Conference

This Kinéis constellation is made of 25 30kg-class satellites, equipped with electric propulsion. The missions are dedicated to IoT (Internet of Things) connectivity and to AIS (Automatic Identification System) monitoring. The satellites were launched by batches of 5, the first took place in June 2024, the last one in March 2025.

The paper discusses how the Ground Control Segment was developed and validated within a complex system and with strong schedule constraints. The validation plan was designed to rapidly de-risk the challenges due to multi- satellite aspects, to focus on a …