Digital Commons Network^™

Implementation And Characterization Of Commercial Off-The-Shelf Inertial Measurement Units For The Attitude Determination System Of The Move-Iii Cubesat, Natalia Piotrowski

Small Satellite Conference

This paper determines a suitable Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) for the Attitude Determination and Control System (ADCS) of the third satellite generation of the Munich Orbital Verification Experiment (MOVE). The ADCS is required to provide an attitude determination with an accuracy of < 1°, which has to be achieved with both IMUs and sun sensors, at a low price, due to a low financial budget. In the context of this work, the three IMUs the BNO055, ICM20948 and LSM9DS1 are selected and analyzed. Additionally, the LIS3MDL magnetometer and the BMI088 gyroscope are used for further analysis and comparison. The error coefficients of each sensor measurement are initially calculated through the Allan variance, and these are then verified through Welch’s power spectral density estimate, simulations, and additional sensor measurements. Further temperature experiments are performed to characterize the behaviour of the sensor under changing temperatures. Evaluating the most accurate error coefficients found the BNO055 gyroscope to be the least affected by the white noise compared to the remaining gyroscopes. The LSM9DS1 appears to be the sensor least influenced by the random walk and white noise term among the magnetometers. The BNO055 magnetometer is the comparatively least affected by temperature changes, while the BMI088 appears the most stable amongst the gyroscopes. Finally, the BNO055 IMU is recommended to the ADCS of the MOVE-III CubeSat. It appeared to be the least influenced by different error sources and the ambient temperature.

On-Board Images To Characterize A Cubesat's Adcs, Boris Segret, Sam Bammens, Sergio Bras, Dominik Marszk, Vasundhara Shiradhonkar, Vladimir Zelenevskiy, David Evans

Small Satellite Conference

ADCS for nanosatellites in the New Space sector are frequently offered as Commercial-Off-The-Shelves (COTS) systems. However, when the COTS datasheet and the actual performance in flight differ dramatically, there are few means to assess the discrepancies. Here, we update on the current operations with a flying nanosatellite to assess the attitude stability during inertial pointing mode, based on the analysis of on-board images of the sky. The satellite is OPS-SAT, a 3-unit CubeSat owned and operated by ESA. The imager is directed to the -Z longitudinal axis and the star tracker and a Sun sensor are oriented in the transversal …

Development And Deployment Of Remotely Operable Optical Communication Terminals, Rudd C. Johnson, Josef M. Wicker, Andrew Lin, Erik C. Dillingham, Paul Le, Jairo Esquivel, John C. Mergo, Darren Rowen

Small Satellite Conference

Since the launch of the Optical Communication and Sensor Demonstration (OCSD) Mission in November 2017, The Aerospace Corporation has relied upon a manually operated optical terminal in El Segundo, CA to support optical communications downlinks. Scaling our constellation of laser communication capable small satellites and resulting increase in data volume has necessitated multiple geographically dispersed optical ground stations. In 2021, The Aerospace Corporation developed and deployed two remotely operable optical terminals in Maui, Hawaii and Albuquerque, New Mexico, demonstrating up to 200 Mbps downlink communication rates with Forward Error Correction. The station is comprised primarily of commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) components …

An Updated Overview Of The Satellite Networked Open Ground Stations (Satnogs) Project, Kevin Croissant, Dan White, Xabier Crespo Álvarez, Vasileios Adamopoulos, Cees Bassa, Redouane Boumghar, Hugh Brown, Fredy Damkalis, Ilias Daradimos, Patrick Dohmen, Julien Flawinne, Jan Van Gils, Mark Jessop, Nikos Karamolegos, Eleftherios Kosmas, Julien Nicolas, Aris Nikas, Dimitrios Papadeas, Pierros Papadeas, Manthos Papamatthaiou, Thanos Patsas, Mixalis Raptakis, Fabian Schmidt, Nestoras Sdoukos, Corey Shields, Manolis Surligas, Kostantinos Triantafyllakis, Nikoletta Triantafyllopoulou, George Tsagkarelis, Vasilis Tsiligiannis, Alexandros Tsourapas, Giorgos Vardakis, Agisilaos Zisimatos

Small Satellite Conference

An overview of the SatNOGS project, a network of satellite ground stations around the world, optimized for modularity, built from readily available and affordable tools and resources. The rate of Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite launches increases with the participation of old and new entities. In this growing environment, SatNOGS provides a scalable and modular solution to track, identify, receive telemetry from, monitor, and assist operators in command/control of satellites. The SatNOGS global community, dedicated to its free and open-source values, develops hardware ground station designs (antennas, rotators, electronics), software for SDR-based communications, satellite scheduling and mission monitoring platforms. SatNOGS …

An Automated Approach To Maneuver Campaign Management For Skysats, Vishnuu Mallik, Joel Mueting, Adam Reuter, Alex Paul, Lisa Mcgill, Bhavi Jagatia, Vishwa Shah

Small Satellite Conference

Planet Labs PBC currently operates a fleet of 21 high-resolution imaging, Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellites called SkySats comprised of both a sun-synchronous constellation and a lower inclination constellation. Due to their low altitude, operational constraints, and mission-driven requirements on image resolution and coverage, there is a need to perform routine stationkeeping and occasional constellation reconfiguration maneuver campaigns for these satellites. The Mission Systems team at Planet is currently implementing an automated and robust maneuver management system that autonomously plans and executes all SkySat maneuvers in order to reduce operator workload and improve overall constellation management efficiency. This paper describes …

Cobalt: The Next Step In Low Swap-C Optical Terminal Design, Scott E. Palo, Ryan Kingsbury, Jon C. Twichell

Small Satellite Conference

Blue Cubed has developed Cobalt, a full duplex optical terminal which can support both symmetric crosslinks and downlinks. The system has been engineered to be modular, easily mass produced and available at a competitive price. Cobalt is intended for low earth orbit small satellite applications that require 100 Mbps to 10 Gbps per communication links at ranges of up to 4000 km. The Cobalt core transceiver (excluding the telescope) is roughly 0.5U (9 x 9 x 5 cm), one kilogram, and consumes 10 W of electrical power for the 3 Gbps system variant. An increased data rate can be achieved …

Active Thermal Control For The Multispectral Earth Sensors (Acmes) Mission, Lucas Anderson, Michael Kirk, Bruno Mattos, Charles Swenson, Chad Fish, Miguel Nunes, Robin Wright

Small Satellite Conference

The Active Thermal Architecture (ATA) is a sub 1U active thermal control system providing payload thermal support and setpoint thermal control for the Active Cooling for Multispectral Earth Sensors (ACMES) mission. Based on a single-phase fluid loop heat exchanger, the ATA features a micro centrifugal pump, an innovative working fluid, and a two-axis flexible rotary fluid joint coupled to a deployable tracking radiator. The ATA system leverages advanced Ultrasonic Additive Manufacturing (UAM) techniques to directly integrate the ATA system within the payload and CubeSat structure. NASA's Science Mission Directorate has selected the ATA system to fly on the ACMES mission. …

Iterative Design Of Rcs Thruster For Debris Chaser Small Satellite Based On Δv Budget, Roshan Sah, Raunak Srivastava, Kaushik Das

Small Satellite Conference

The active debris removal (ADR) missions have been advanced continuously for debris management in low earth orbit (LEO). One of the emerging ADR methods is space robotics, where robotic manipulators are installed in small satellite setup whose main function is to chase, capture and de-orbit the space debris to a very lower altitude. This poster presents the preliminary iterative design of the RCS thruster which will execute the chase and de-orbit operation by using the value of ΔV requirements for overall operation. The RCS thrusters are a combination of a cold/hot gas thruster with a 3-axis CD nozzle in it …

Avionics System And Attitude Algorithms For A Deorbit Device Based On An Electrodynamic Tether, Sergio Garcia-Gonzalez, Lorenzo Tarabini Castellani, Sofia Orte, Asier Ortega, Gonzalo Sanchez-Arriaga, Enrico C. Lorenzini, Martin Tajmar, Katja Wätzig

Small Satellite Conference

The main goal of the Electrodynamic Tether technology for PAssive Consumable-less deorbit Kit (E.T.PACK) project is to develop a deorbit device based on an electrodynamic tether with TRL 4 by 2022. In September 2022, its continuation, i.e. the E.T.PACK-F project, will carry on with the activities of E.T.PACK to prepare a flight model with TRL 8 that will be tested in an in-orbit demonstration mission in 2025. This work (i) describes the attitude determination and control strategy of the mission, which is used as a means of explaining its different phases and the dynamics of each one of them, (ii) …

Cold Atom Space Payload Atmospheric Drag Mission (Caspa-Adm), Jorge Ferreras, Joe Spencer, Mike Salter, Tristan Valenzuela, Isabelle Riou, Marton Kiss-Toth, Ryan Renshaw, Michael Trigatzis, Lucy Moore, Steven Maddox, Michael Holynski, Sanaz Roshanmanesh, Johnathan Winch, Andrew Lamb, Farzad Hayati, Kai Bongs

Small Satellite Conference

To gain better understanding of the upper atmospheric dynamics requires more accurate determination of the mass density distribution in the thermosphere. Improved measurements of drag, by means of satellite accelerometery, can be used to more precisely determine this distribution. In addition, atmospheric drag in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) is particularly of interest for climate modelling, weather forecasting and satellite orbit prediction. RAL Space, Teledyne-e2v and the University of Birmingham are developing a Cold Atom Space Payload Atmospheric Drag Mission (CASPA-ADM). The aim of the project, supported by the UK Centre for Earth Observation Instrumentation (CEOI), is to develop a technology …

Cubesat Reusable Interface Software Platform (Crisp): A Lightweight Message-Bus-Based Flight Software Architecture For Rapid Payload Integration, Rory H. Scobie, Kevin D. Kaufeld, Bradley J. Hoose, Keith S. Morgan, Kimberly K. Katko, Markus P. Hehlen, John M. Michel

Small Satellite Conference

The Agile Space portfolio of projects at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) develops low-cost, rapidly-deployable space payloads and systems. To increase the agility of future missions, we are developing CRISP: the CubeSat Reusable Interface Software Platform. CRISP provides a lightweight and reusable flight software framework for rapid integration of custom payloads with commercial microsatellite platforms. CRISP cuts development time and costs by reducing non-recurring engineering (NRE); thereby accelerating mission agility. To achieve these goals, CRISP provides a core set of payload/data management functions and abstracts the interface between the bus avionics and the payload(s). CRISP currently consists of the following …

Nepal's Danfe Space Mission: Technology Demonstration Mission On A 3u Cubesat To Mitigate Glacial Lake Outburst Floods, Sirash Sayanju, Janardhan Silwal, Devraj Pant, Sagar Koirala, Bikalpa Dhungana, Abhas Maskey

Small Satellite Conference

The United Nations Development Program ranks Nepal as the fourth-most country susceptible to climate change. The Global warming has caused more than 40 glacial lakes to potentially burst at any moment. A few Early Warning Systems are in place but are connected by ground cellular networks. A ground-to-space monitoring system instead, can help deter Glacial Lake Outburst Flood reliably. This paper outlines such a system through Nepal's Danfe Space Mission placed on a 3U CubeSat. Danfe demonstrates the first use case of ported PX4 drone Operating System alongside a LoRa integrated STM32 Satellite System-on-Chip. A Ground Sensor Terminal with ultrasonic …

Novel Constellation Design Tool: A Framework For Asymmetric Constellation Design, Kyle Casey, William Hunter

Small Satellite Conference

This paper addresses the problem of optimization of earth orbit space vehicle constellations balancing access over specified earth regions subject to constraints on the constituent members’ orbital elements. Whereas symmetric constellations such as Walker Delta Parameter Constellations are often a convenient starting point for system trade studies, the desire to balance access over multiple earth latitude bands requires exploration of asymmetric constellations. This paper proposes a simple, yet effective method to rapidly test asymmetric constellation designs incorporating arbitrary constraints on the space vehicles’ orbital elements. A user of this novel Constellation Design Tool (CDT) provides inputs to the code, including …

Promoting Satellite Communications: Training Students In The Design Of Nano-Satellite Communications, Boston Viorel, Ilco Valentin, Melnic Vladimir, Martiniuc Alexei, Varzaru Vladimir, Secrieru Nicolae

Small Satellite Conference

The National Center for Space Technologies (NCST) of Technical University of Moldova (TUM) has been oriented towards a series of nanosatellites, according to the international standard CubeSat. In 2019, NCST participated in the fourth round of the KiboCUBE Program with the nanosatellite “TUMnanoSAT”.

KiboCUBE Program is a collaboration between UNOOSA and JAXA that aims to provide to the United Nations Organization members opportunity to launch CubeSat satellites developed for educational and research purposes.

The NCST team was selected by the Japan Aerospace Agency (JAXA) and the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA) for the fourth round of the …

Space-Operating Linux: An Operating System For High Performance Ai Computation On Commercial-Grade Equipment In Low Earth Orbit, Eric Miller

Small Satellite Conference

With recent exponential advances in AI—particularly with respect to the tremendous power and efficiency accessible for data processing—there is now a countless array of applications for aerospace missions and space exploration, even in experimental CubeSats. However, with the large volume of data acquisition required for satellite missions, downlinking presents an increasingly expensive bottleneck that drastically reduces mission efficiency. At the University of Georgia Small Satellite Research Laboratory, the Multi-view Onboard Computational Imager (MOCI) employs an NVIDIA Jetson TX2i GPU module to process data in situ and downlink only final products. As is the case for many commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) devices …

David The First 6u Cubesat Mission Of The Italian Space Agency Programme Iperdrone As Demonstration Of New On Orbit Services Performed By Space Drones, Raffaele Votta, Roberto Gardi, Emanuele Zaccagnino, Margherita Cardi, Alessia Basler, Filippo Corradino, Giorgio Taiano, Fabrizio Carrai, Fabrizio Carubia, Marco Di Clemente, Marta Albano, Alberto Fedele

Small Satellite Conference

The Italian Space Agency is promoting a roadmap for the design, manufacturing and operation of a new space reentry drone. The Iperdrone program will qualify a new type of operative mission, through an incremental phased approach. The program includes, as first step, the demonstration of inspection services for the International Space Station, optimizing the EVA activities and increasing the in space experimentation opportunities. The paper will present the status of development of the first mission, which will demonstrate the system's capabilities such as proximity operations, inspection and interaction with a target, including a close rendez-vous demonstration. The first mission, DAVID …

Eis: A Unique Hyperspectral Pathfinder Mission Combining The Compact Elois Instrument And The Innosat Smallsat Platform, Vincent Moreau, Gregory Lousberg, Vincent Tigny, Jochem Van Der Maas, Eric Callut, Alexandre Gilles, Julien Nuttin, Enne Hekma, Bastiaan Lagaune, Staffan Persson

Small Satellite Conference

The EIS mission is a new IOD/IOV mission under the “Horizon 2020” program of the European Union. It combines the innovative ELOIS hyperspectral instrument with the flight-proven InnoSat platform to form a hyperspectral imaging mission offering excellent value for money. OHB Sweden is responsible for the platform, payload integration, system level AIT and for the ground segment incl. operations, while AMOS is delivering the instrument and will validate the data. The target orbit is a LEO SSO orbit at 630 km and the lifetime is 5 years. The platform is enhanced with very high pointing performance and stability and an …

Nachos, A Cubesat-Based High-Resolution Uv-Visible Hyperspectral Imager For Remote Sensing Of Trace Gases: System Overview, Science Objectives, And Preliminary Results, Steven P. Love, Kirk W. Post, Logan A. Ott, Magdalena E. Dale, Claira L. Safi, Kerry G. Boyd, Hannah D. Mohr, Christian Ward, Michael Caffrey, James P. Theiler, Bernard R. Foy, Markus Hehlen, Charles Glen Peterson, Ryan Hemphill, James A. Wren, Arthur A. Guthrie, Nicholas A. Dallmann, Paul S. Stein, Aaron G. Meyer, Manvendra K. Dubey

Small Satellite Conference

The Nano-satellite Atmospheric Chemistry Hyperspectral Observation System (NACHOS) is a high-throughput (f/2.9), high spectral resolution (1.3 nm optical, 0.57 nm sampling) hyperspectral imager covering the 300-500 nm spectral region with 350 spectral bands. The combined 1.5U instrument payload and 1.5U spacecraft bus comprise a 3U CubeSat. Spectroscopically similar to NASA’s Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI), which provides wide-field coverage at ~20 km spatial resolution, NACHOS offers complementary targeted measurements at far higher spatial resolution of ~0.4 km/pixel from 500 km altitude over its 15 ̊ across-track field of view. NACHOS incorporates highly streamlined onboard gas-retrieval algorithms, alleviating the need to routinely …

Scouting For Climate Variable With Small Satellites, Andy Palfreyman, Alex De Silva Curial, Jonathan Rawlinson, Martin Unwin, Martin Sweeting, Serena Donati, Nazzareno Pierdicca, Estel Cardellach, Leila Guerriero, Giuseppe Foti, Emanuele Santi, Paul Blunt, Kimmo Rautiainen, Jean-Pascal Lejault, Maria Paola Clarizia, Massimiliano Pastena

Small Satellite Conference

HydroGNSS is a small satellite mission under the new ESA Scout programme tapping into NewSpace, within ESA’s FutureEO programme. The mission will use an innovative GNSS-Reflectometry instrument to collect parameters related to the Essential Climate Variables (ECVs): soil moisture, inundation, freeze/thaw, biomass, ocean wind speed and sea ice extent. GNSS-Reflectometry is a type of bistatic radar utilizing abundant GNSS signals as signals of opportunity, empowering small satellites to provide measurement quality associated with larger satellites.

The HydroGNSS instrument introduces novel measurements compared to its predecessors on UKSA TechDemoSat-1 and NASA CYGNSS missions. These include: the acquisition of Galileo(E1) reflections, and …

Cubespec, A Mission Overview, Bart Vandenbussche, Gert Raskin, Pierre Royer, Dominic Bowman, Hugues Sana, Andrew Tkachenko, Jan Goris, Job Schuermans, Dirk Vandepitte, Jeroen De Maeyer, Filip Heylen, Wim De Munter, Maarten Kempenaers, Jelle Lanting, Bram Vandoren, Tjorven Delabie, Vincent Moreau, Etienne Renotte, Peter Davidsen, Karl Kaas, Roger Walker, Camille Pirat

Small Satellite Conference

CubeSpec is an in-orbit demonstration CubeSat mission in the ESA technology programme, developed and funded in Belgium. The goal of the mission is to demonstrate high-spectral-resolution astronomical spectroscopy from a 6-unit CubeSat. The prime science demonstration case for the in-orbit demonstration mission is to unravel the interior of massive stars using asteroseismology by high-cadance monitoring of the variations in spectral line profiles during a few months. The technological challenges are numerous. The 10x20cm aperture telescope and echelle spectrometer have been designed to fit in a 10x10x20cm volume.

Under low-Earth orbit thermal variations, maintaining the fast telescope focus and spectrometer alignment …

Responsive Operations For Key Services (Roks): A Modular, Low Swap Quantum Communications Payload, Craig D. Colquhoun, Hazel Jeffrey, Steve Greenland, Sonali Mohapatra, Colin Aitken, Mikulas Cebecauer, Charlotte Crawshaw, Kenny Jeffrey, Toby Jeffreys, Philippos Karagiannakis, Ahren Mctaggart, Caitlin Stark, Jack Wood, Siddarth K. Joshi, Jaya Sagar, Elliott Hastings, Peide Zhang, Milan Stefko, David Lowndes, John G. Rarity, Jasminder S. Sidhu, Thomas Brougham, Duncan Mcarthur, Robert G. Pousa, Daniel K. L. Oi, Matthew Warden, Eilidh Johnston, John Leck

Small Satellite Conference

Quantum key distribution (QKD) is a theoretically proven future-proof secure encryption method that inherits its security from fundamental physical principles. With a proof-of-concept QKD payload having flown on the Micius satellite since 2016, efforts have intensified globally. Craft Prospect, working with a number of UK organisations, has been focused on miniaturising the technologies that enable QKD so that they may be used in smaller platforms including nanosatellites. The significant reduction of size, and therefore the cost of launching quantum communication technologies either on a dedicated platform or hosted as part of a larger optical communications will improve potential access to …

The Nasa Time-Resolved Observations Of Precipitation Structure And Storm Intensity With A Constellation Of Smallsats (Tropics) Mission: Results From The Pathfinder Demonstration And Look Ahead To The Constellation Mission, William J. Blackwell, David Crompton, Andrew Cunningham, Shawn Donnelly, James Eshbaugh, Vincent Leslie, Brian Powers, Nicholas Zorn, Kerri Cahoy, Amelia Gagnon, Samantha Hasler, Daniel Adams, Owen Hart, Jostein Johansen, Ian Murray, Benjamin Kim, William Mccarty, Garrett Skrobot, Genevieve Taylor, Stuart Cooke, Michael Grant, Scott Braun

Small Satellite Conference

The NASA Time-Resolved Observations of Precipitation structure and storm Intensity with a Constellation of Smallsats (TROPICS) mission will provide nearly all-weather observations of 3-D temperature and humidity, as well as cloud ice and precipitation horizontal structure, at high temporal resolution to conduct high-value science investigations of tropical cyclones. TROPICS will provide rapid-refresh microwave measurements (median refresh rate of approximately 50 minutes for the baseline mission) over the tropics that can be used to observe the thermodynamics of the troposphere and precipitation structure for storm systems at the mesoscale and synoptic scale over the entire storm lifecycle. The TROPICS constellation mission …

Lunah-Map: Revealing Lunar Water With A New Radiation Sensor Array, Craig Hardgrove, Lena Heffern, Joe Dubois, Ernest Cisneros, James Bell, Richard Starr, Thomas Prettyman, Igor Lazbin, Bob Roebuck, Nathaniel Struebel, Ethan Clark, Derek Nelson, Jeremy Bauman, Bobby Williams, Erik Johnson, James Christian, Graham Stoddard, Michael Tsay, Joshua Model, Pete Hruby, Alessandra Babuscia, Steve Stem, Devon Sanders, Elliot Hegel, Mitchell Wiens, Sean Parlapiano, Patrick Hailey, Tyler O'Brien, Katherine Mesick, Dan Coupland

Small Satellite Conference

A new type of neutron and gamma-ray spectrometer called the Miniature Neutron Spectrometer (Mini-NS) has been developed, assembled, qualified and delivered as part of the Lunar Polar Hydrogen Mapper (LunaH-Map) cubesat mission. The LunaH-Map spacecraft is currently manifested as a secondary payload on the Space Launch System (SLS) Artemis-1 rocket. LunaH-Map will deploy from Artemis-1 and enter a low altitude perilune elliptical orbit around the Moon. The Mini-NS will measure the lunar epithermal neutron albedo, and measurements around perilune will be used to produce maps of hydrogen enrichments and depletions across the lunar South Pole region including both within and …

Safe Space Conduct: Nasa Best Practices For Smallsats, Lauri Newman

Small Satellite Conference

No abstract provided.

Science And Technology: Pushing The Bounds To Infinity And Beyond, Andy Williams

Small Satellite Conference

No abstract provided.

Cislunar Small Satellites And The Artemis Program, James Spann

Small Satellite Conference

No abstract provided.

Double Asteroid Redirection Test (Dart): Earth Strikes Back, Elena Adams

Small Satellite Conference

No abstract provided.

Breaking The Rocket Equation: How Refuellable Spacecraft Change The Dynamics Of Space Transportation, J. Oorebeek, R. A. Opperman, A. Drossler, D. Buckley Biggs

Small Satellite Conference

One of the chief tenets of space transportation has been the immutability of the Tsiolkovsky rocket equation, placing great emphasis on the specific impulse of a thruster to determine the propellant mass. For applications where all propellant must be carried from the start, this drives most vehicle designs to the highest possible ISP. The compromise is the typical tradeoff between ISP and thrust magnitude. Thus, transfers which require either impulsive maneuvers or a tight timeline will favor low-ISP platforms.

If adequate infrastructure is provided to allow for a refuellable spacecraft, a smaller and lighter vehicle can be used. This vehicle …

Delta-Vs And Design Reference Mission Scenarios For Mars Missions, Ryan C. Woolley, Nathan J. Barba

Small Satellite Conference

Before setting out on any long journey, it is important to first have an idea about how to get there, how long it might take, and how much it will cost. Primarily, the answers depend upon where you are starting and where you wish to go. In the formulative stages of any mission to Mars, having quick estimates of answers to these basic questions will aid in the efficient exploration of the trade space. In this paper, we present a “mileage chart” of sorts illustrating the range of ΔV’s and times-of-flight (TOF) between various starting and stopping points between Earth …

Nanosatellite Launch Forecasts - Track Record And Latest Prediction, Erik Kulu

Small Satellite Conference

After almost 300 CubeSats were sent to space in 2017, the following 3 years saw a continued decline. While 2021 set a new record of about 326 nanosatellites launched, most published forecasts and expectations from the last 10 years about the growth about CubeSats have not come to fruition. This paper attempts to answer the question why and make a new prediction based on scheduled missions and historic trends.

First part of the paper presents the latest nanosatellite and CubeSat launch statistics. Out of over 3400 entries in the database, 2068 nanosatellites or 1893 CubeSats have been launched as of …