Digital Commons Network^™

Flight Path: A Microservices Message-Passing Flight Software Architecture For Cesiumastro Element One Satellite, Dylan Pfeifer, Russell Gleason, Nick Bourdon, David Gholami, Daniel Zilavy, Dan Barrera, John Storey

Small Satellite Conference

The CesiumAstro Element One Satellite, designed for multi-band phased array communications in Low Earth Orbit, required a new approach to satellite flight software. The variety of new devices on the satellite bus, fast-paced development schedule, and combination of in-house and purchased subsystems required flight software to incorporate a mixture of programming languages, a mixture of open source and proprietary software, and a pairing of high Technology Readiness Level (TRL) frameworks with new, first-flight software. To achieve integration, assembly, and test on compressed schedule, the flight software paradigm focused on microservices-brokered access to hardware and a message-passing based coordination between software …

Mirzo Ulugbek 6u Cubesat: Modular Structural Design, Analysis, And Ait For Earth Observation Mission Deployment, Hery Steven Mindarno, Louis Alferd Gauvain Lefort, Khabibullokh Olimjon Ugli Azimjonov, Iwase Tomoya, Aashish Sarode, Chinathip Narongphun, Reynel Josue Galindo Rosales, Mehmet Esit, Hanadi Abdalla, Kaito Hamada, Victor Schulz, Jose Rodrigo Cordova Alarcon, Hirokazu Masui, Takashi Yamauchi, Necmi Cihan Orger, Kentaro Kitamura, Mengu Cho

Small Satellite Conference

The Mirzo Ulugbek satellite is a 6U CubeSat designed for Earth Observation (EO) and equipped with a high-resolution camera system. Developed in collaboration between the Kyushu Institute of Technology (Kyutech) and the Uzbekistan Space Agency, Mirzo Ulugbek will be deployed directly from a launch vehicle into a Sun-Synchronous Orbit (SSO) to enable continuous Earth observation. This paper presents the modular structural design, analysis, and Assembly, Integration, and Testing (AIT) processes that ensure the satellite’s robustness during launch and reliable operation in orbit. The modular design allows efficient integration, disassembly, and reassembly of subsystems, enhancing flexibility during testing. This design approach …

Tasa Cubesat Constellations For Remote Sensing And Communications As Catalysts For Local Innovation And Global Impact, Chia-Ray Chen, Yu-Tang You, Yu-Wei Chiu, Jeffery Lin, Jay Zheng, Eason Wu, Ching-Yuan Lu, Jacky Li, Benson Lin, Ching-En Lo, Samuel Liu, Larry Hung, Keng Chen, Jhih-Hong Lin, Chih-Chung Chiang, Bo-Chuan Lin, Sheng Hua Chen, Shin Chen, Yu-Hsuan Kuo, Li-Wen Yu, Zu-Hung Kuo, Yi-Hsiang Wang, Yu-Chen Wang, Wei-Chih Su, Cheng-Hung Huang, Heng-Yi Lin, Szu-Hsiang Lai, Chang-Heng Wang, Tun-Yen Wu, Yu-Jiu Wang

Small Satellite Conference

The Startup CubeSat Program is a government-supported initiative established to advance Taiwan’s domestic space industry and strengthen national capabilities in small satellite technologies through close collaboration among academia, industry, research organizations, and the Taiwan Space Agency (TASA). Acting as an incubator framework, the program aims to accelerate technological innovation, promote cost-effective satellite development, and foster a sustainable ecosystem for commercial and scientific space activities. The program consists of three representative missions: a remote sensing mission for ocean color imaging (OCI) and fisheries monitoring, an IoT mission providing Ku-band and LoRa-band connectivity services, and a Ka-band communication mission demonstrating broadband satellite …

Operating The Sparcs Space Telescope, Kaitlyn Ashcroft, Daniel Jacobs, Evgenya Shkolnik, Judd Bowman, Matthew Kolopanis, Tahina Ramiaramanantsoa, Joe Dubois, Titu Samson, Maria C. Ladwig, Joshua Sink, Ella Greetis, Paulo Gonzalez Soto, Ysabella Mcauliffe, Lilian Prigge, Aaron Boumias, Ishi Shah, Hetvi Patel, Joseph Dukowitz, David R. Ardila, April Jewell, Mark Swain, Shouleh Nikzad, Christophe Basset, Joe Llama, Paul Scowen, Sarah Peacock, Dawn Gregory, Nathaniel Streubel, Logan Jensen, Johnathan Gamaunt, Travis Barman, Victoria Meadows

Small Satellite Conference

Star-Planet Research CubeSat (SPARCS) is a 6U space telescope dedicated to monitoring flares from low-mass stars in the ultraviolet (UV). SPARCS observations of flares across 20 solar systems will be used to better understand the atmospheric evolution, chemistry, and potential habitability of the most common type of exoplanets. SPARCS’ camera uses delta-doped CCD detectors, which are several times more sensitive in the UV than previous detectors. This is technology necessary for future studies of habitable-worlds and star–planet interactions by future missions, such as NASA’s flagship mission, the Habitable Worlds Observatory. SPARCS orbits in the “6am terminator” orbit, which provides a …

Multi-Modal Detection And Attribution Algorithm For Low Power Edge Compute Hardware, Margaret Michelsen, Jackson Gardner, Shawn Jones, Jackson Kulik, Mario Harper

Small Satellite Conference

We present a multi-modal detection and attribution algorithm for maritime domain awareness designed to execute on low-power FPGA-based edge compute hardware. Spaceborne hyperspectral sensors generate data volumes far exceeding practical downlink capacity, yet the onboard compute platforms available for real-time processing operate within strict power, memory, and radiation constraints. The proposed algorithm fuses RX anomaly scoring, ACE matched filtering, multi-spectral index evaluation, wake-aware spatial scoring, and spectral glint cancellation in a five-stage pipeline designed for hardware-efficient execution. Mixed-precision quantization assigns FP16 arithmetic to covariance-sensitive stages and INT8 to threshold-based spectral computations, achieving a 12.4× model size reduction and 6.1× compute …

Mechanical Design Of A 100-Chipsat Suborbital Deployer For The Descent Mission, Richard Zheng, Ocean Saric, Will Kully, Henry Wolf, Peter Nguyen, Sarah Cooper, Christopher Draikiwicz, Adam Yonas, Joshua Umansky-Castro, Mark Lohatepanont, H. Todd Smith

Small Satellite Conference

DeSCENT (Demonstration of Suborbital ChipSats Ejected from New Shepard Test Flight) aims to deploy 100 ChipSats –gram-scale spacecraft– from Blue Origin’s New Shepard launch vehicle. Led by students of the Cornell University Space Systems Design Studio in collaboration with JHU-APL, the experiment characterizes ChipSat dispersion and free-fall kinematics from the K´arm´an line while exploring their potential for distributed sensing for atmospheric science. This paper outlines the design, integration, and test of the ChipSat deployer to be mounted on the New Shepard propulsion module in coordination with the JHU-APL JANUS payload. Details are shared on the overall mechanical design, driven by …

Lunar Intelligent Navigation Neural Architecture (Linna), Gleisson Bezerra, Pedro Fernandes Varela, Felipe Oliveira Tavares, Renan Guilherme Menezes, Lidia Shibuya Sato, Luis Eduardo Loures

Small Satellite Conference

This paper presents the design and preliminary validation of the Lunar Intelligent Navigation Neural Architecture (LINNA) payload, a technology demonstration integrated into the SelenITA mission—Brazil’s first lunar CubeSat. The experiment is motivated by the future needs for autonomous state estimation in the Very Low Lunar Orbit (VLLO) regime, where Mascon-induced gravitational anomalies challenge traditional inertial-only navigation. The primary goal of LINNA is to evaluate the feasibility of conducting onboard, vision-based positioning as a future auxiliary system for autonomous Guidance, Navigation, and Control (GNC). LINNA operates as a standalone technological experiment, using a nadir-pointing optical sensor to capture lunar surface data …

The Solar Neutrino And Astro-Particle Physics (Snappy) Cubesat Development, Brian M. Sutin, Edward Bierens, Brian Doty, Atri Dutta, Jonathan Folkerts, Brooks Hartsock, Kyle Messick, Holger Meyer, Daniel Reichart, Nick Solomey, Mark Crystal, Miguel Rodriguez-Otero, Evgeny Kuznetsov, Robert Mctaggart, James Cutler, Joel Steinkraus, Jose G. Rivera

Small Satellite Conference

The SNAPPY CubeSat, which was launched May 3, 2026, will demonstrate and space qualify the νSol neutrino-detection technology. The NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts (NIAC) program funded the νSol study to determine the scientific and technical challenges associated with a solar neutrino detector operating in close orbit around the Sun, such as a Parker Solar Probe–like orbit at 7 solar radii and potentially as close as 3 solar radii. This program began in 2017 and has continued with funding from NIAC and NASA’s Heliophysics Division. The νSol technology detects solar neutrinos using a gallium isotope which decays by …

Neutron-2: A Dual Cubesat Mission For Three-Dimensional Mapping Of Neutron Radiation In Low Earth Orbit, Miguel Nunes, Piper Kline, Kenoi Salvador, Peter Englert, William Edmonson, Craig Hardgrove, Erik B. Johnson

Small Satellite Conference

Neutron interactions in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) remain a poorly characterized component of the space radiation environment, despite their potential to significantly impact spacecraft electronics, materials, and crew health. Unlike primary charged particles, most neutrons in LEO are secondary products generated when high-energy protons and heavy ions from galactic cosmic rays or solar energetic particle events interact with atoms and molecules in Earth’s atmosphere. The production rate of these secondary neutrons is strongly dependent on atmospheric density, which varies with altitude, geomagnetic position, and solar activity, leading to spatial and temporal variability that is not well captured by current radiation …

Flight Model Development And Initial Operational Results Of The Rapid Alert Demonstration Satellite Arica-2, Hayato Mabuchi, Takanori Sakamoto, Motoko Serino, Shuntaro Morikawa, Shion Nojima, Rento Okita, Satoshi Moriyama, Seiya Shigeoka, Teruaki Enoto

Small Satellite Conference

AGU Remote Innovative CubeSat Alert System-2 (ARICA-2) is a 2U CubeSat designed to demonstrate rapid alerts for transient astrophysical events such as gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) by utilizing commercial satellite communications. Because GRBs are difficult to predict and have very short durations, immediate detection and rapid alert dissemination to enable follow-up observations by other instruments are critically important for understanding these phenomena. This satellite aims to address this challenge by adopting commercial satellite communication systems as its alert transmission method. The spacecraft is equipped with commercial satellite communication terminals, including Iridium SBD and Globalstar STX-3. The onboard computer (OBC) is Sony's …

Operational Challenges And Lessons Learned For Very Low Earth Orbit Cubesats, Adrian Bryant, Angela Crews, Sierra Flynn, Scott Gennari, Marcin Pilinksi, Nicholas Ratajczyk

Small Satellite Conference

Interest in Very Low Earth Orbit (VLEO) for small satellite applications has surged in the past half-decade, from industry, scientific, and governmental institutions. Operating at VLEO altitudes is incredibly challenging. The density of the residual atmosphere, and therefore the drag force experienced, grows exponentially as the orbital altitude decreases. The high-drag environment complicates orbit determination, minimizes anomaly response time, increases momentum management requirements, and may require significant re-concepting of operations. The Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics (LASP) SmallSat Operations (SMOPS) group had the unique opportunity to partner with the University of Colorado Boulder National Security Initiatives (CU NSI) and …

Results From Nasa’S Distributed Spacecraft Autonomy Project’S Extended Mission On Starling, Caleb Adams, Michael Iatauro, Brian Kempa, K. Michael Dalal, Sergei Gridnev, Michael Ho, Caroline Lassiter

Small Satellite Conference

The Distributed Spacecraft Autonomy (DSA) experiments on Starling 1.0 marked a significant milestone as the first demonstration of fully autonomous distributed operations on multiple spacecraft. DSA demonstrated the ability to adapt to measurements of Total Electron Content (TEC) and visibility of GPS satellites in a fully distributed autonomous manner. In subsequent experiments, DSA 1.5 focused on improving its science proxy towards a higher fidelity data product computed at the edge, as well as addressing emergent autonomy needs from Starling 1.0, particularly local autonomy and robust crosslink data transfer.

The purpose of improving the TEC measurement was to demonstrate that high-quality …

Ground-Based Magnetic Attitude Determination For Low-Cost Cubesat Missions, Johnny Mccaskill, Evan Jellison, Jackson Holden, Blagoy Rangelov

Small Satellite Conference

This work presents the development and validation of a low-cost attitude determination approach for small satellites operating in low Earth orbit using only magnetometer data. The proposed method leverages measurements of Earth’s magnetic field collected by onboard magnetometers in conjunction with orbital information processed on the ground. By comparing observed magnetic field vectors with reference values generated from the World Magnetic Model, the system estimates the satellite’s orientation with minimal onboard processing requirements. The resulting attitude solution is then transmitted back to the spacecraft for potential use in attitude control or mission planning.

Because all computation occurs on the ground, …

Successful Deployment Of The First Free-Flying Light Sail: Results From The Cornell University Alpha Cubesat Mission, Joshua Umansky-Castro, Jonathan Ma, Duncan Mcdonald, Damian Hackett, Zach Garcia, Lauren Greenhill, Eric Zhang, Cameron Goddard, Y. Deemo Chen, Matthew Hurford, Apurva Hanwadikar, Grace Tang, Gillis Lowry, Mason Peck, Andrew Filo, Alex Burke

Small Satellite Conference

Alpha CubeSat is a mission led by students of the Cornell University Space Systems Design Studio to deploy a ChipSat-equipped free-flying retroreflective light sail in LEO. The spacecraft launched with NASA CSLI on the NG-23 ISS cargo resupply mission on September 14th, 2025 and deployed from the space station as part of NRCSD-29 on December 2nd, 2025. The mission was a success, with all primary mission objectives accomplished. This paper presents the mission results, with insights into the critical decision-making made within the first 48hrs of the mission to deploy and establish contact with the light sail payload. From conception …

A Resilient-By-Design Command & Data Bus Architecture For Small Satellites, Jay Deorukhkar, Peter W. Pachowicz

Small Satellite Conference

As the proliferation of small satellites continues at a staggering rate, so does the mission complexity and criticality of ensuring reliability throughout the satellite bus. Specifically, the command and data bus connecting subsystems within a small satellite can experience radiation-induced faults that potentially derail the satellite’s intended operation, necessitating architecture- and protocol-level fault management. This paper presents an innovative ”Resilient-by-design” communication bus that incorporates a dual-hot redundant architecture and an intelligent, adaptive protocol to coordinate messages and manage faults in an autonomous, self-recoverable manner.

R5 Spacecraft 7, 9, And 10: Proximity Operations, Optical Comm, And Edge Compute, Sam Pedrotty, James Berck, Jack Wisbiski, Kelly Mann, Andrzej Jackowski, Jacob Nunez-Kearny, Robin Onsay, Faheem Quazi, Thomas Kirven, Rob Stoddard, Jordan Fogg, Roger Hunter, Anup Parikh, Alex Bongiovanni, Shrusti Jain, Cassidy Kuehl, Kyle Merry, Luke Duffield

Small Satellite Conference

The Realizing Rapid, Reduced-cost high-Risk Research (R5) project has designed, assembled, integrated, tested, delivered, and launched three spacecraft with three unique missions in fiscal year 2026. Each spacecraft has applied lessons learned from the prior to enhance the cost and schedule reductions of the R5 process while reducing risk and maximizing spacecraft capabilities. Spacecraft 7 (R5-S7) completed suborbital proximity operations around a Falcon 9 upper stage in November of 2025 using an industrial LiDAR for relative navigation. Spacecraft 10 (R5-S10) launched on Transporter 16 and is intended to build on R5-S7’s mission by completing proximity operations in orbit around a …

In-Orbit Results Of Autonomous Formation Flight And Gnss-Based Relative Navigation In The Nanoff Mission, Grant Regen, Fynn Boyer, Sascha Kapitola, Debdeep Roychowdhury, Alan Legenza, Mara Krachten, Ben Palmer, Enrico Stoll

Small Satellite Conference

The Nanosatellites in Formation Flight (NanoFF) mission demonstrates autonomous proximity operations using two 2U CubeSats equipped with resistojet propulsion as well as advanced onboard navigation and communication systems. Launched in December 2023 and deployed into a partial helix orbit in January 2024, NanoFF has conducted precision formation flight and cooperative inter-satellite operations relevant to future small-satellite constellations. This paper presents recent in-orbit results obtained during an extended operational phase of the mission. Both spacecraft are equipped with GNSS receivers enabling precise position and orbit determination. A key architectural element is the use of an inter-satellite link (ISL) in the ultra …

Arcstone: Calibration Of Lunar Spectral Reflectance From Space - One Year On-Orbit Performance, Michael Cooney, Cindy Young, Mark Banchy, Noah Ryan

Small Satellite Conference

Arcstone is a 6U CubeSat launched June 2025 to demonstrate in-space validation of an approach for measuring the lunar disk reflectance to a high degree of accuracy, which will be used to create a new lunar model for calibration of reflected solar instruments. The mission was funded via NASA's InVEST program and had design input, analysis, management and operation from NASA Langley Research Center with multiple collaborators doing additional design work, calibration, and analysis. The Arcstone instrument is a hyperspectral instrument spanning the spectral range from 350 nm to 2300 nm. Arcstone views the Moon and the Sun controlling detector …

I Think I'M Falling For You: Xvi Mission's Final Days In Orbit, Lee Jasper, Erika A. Chavez, Andrew A. Knuth, Adam T. Reinelt, Cameron Shideler, Jayce Thedford, Declan Byrne, Michael Dompke

Small Satellite Conference

The Air Force Research Lab’s (AFRL) Small Satellite Portfolio (SSP) created the XVI CubeSat which was launched on SpaceX’s Transporter 8 in June of 2023. 

XVI remained operational from June 2023 until its deorbit on January 7, 2026. Throughout its lifetime, the team maintained the vehicle and used XVI for experimentation and training purposes. However, due to the sun's low activity around this time frame, and intentionally lowering the drag/cross sectional area of XVI on orbit, the spacecraft was able to stay in orbit for months beyond its initial predicted re-entry. 

Between January 4th and January 7th, XVI was tracked …

Student-Led Operational Framework And Initial On-Orbit Lessons Learned In Multifunctional Membrane Mission Helios-R, Daichi Ishido, Masanori Matsushita, Yuki Takao, Ahmed Kiyoshi Sugihara, Osamu Mori, Tetsuya Kusumoto, Yukiho Ohtsuki, Yuto Nakagawa, Haruhito Ohki, Kaho Nakagawa, Shusaku Tsuruya, Masaaki Shigematsu, Fumiya Aono, Kaine Amakawa, Akihiro Kushima, Ayumu Kawasaki, Jiro Takada, Hinata Yamamoto, Reiji Kobayashi, Ryuki Shimizu, Hiroaki Yoneda, Hirona Kawahara, Junya Taguchi, Satsuki Yokohori, Tomoyo Shibata, Kazuki Hamatsuki, Mao Takata, Toshiyuki Hori, Hiroaki Ito, Akihito Watanabe, Sota Kume, Atsuki Ochi, Takuma Komaba, Hiraku Sakamoto, Atsushi Shirane, Kenichi Okada, Ayako Torisaka, Nobukatsu Okuizumi, Yasutaka Satou, Yasuyuki Miyazaki, Atsuhiko Senba

Small Satellite Conference

To enable a broad range of space activities, small satellites require innovative solutions for lightweight, high-power generation. HELIOS-R (Harvesting Energy with Lightweight Integrated Origami Structure), co-developed by JAXA, Institute of Science Tokyo, and Sakase Adtech Co., Ltd., is a pioneering multifunctional membrane component. Launched in December 2025 as part of the RAISE-4 mission, it integrates thin-film solar arrays, a 5G array antenna, and an interferometer antenna on a 1-meter equilateral triangular membrane. This paper details a reliable operational framework developed by a diverse, student-led team from JAXA/ISAS to address stringent operational constraints and technical challenges arising from severe launch delays. …

Long-Term Software-Defined Formation Flying And Its Application To Space Mimo Communications, Takaya Inamori, Keita Tanaka, Kiyoshi Kinefuchi, Shigeru Sunada, Yousuke Kawabata, Ayumu Nono, Takumi Noro, Yukihisa Otani, Norihide Miyamura, Eiji Okamoto, Yuma Abe, Yoshimi Fujii, Hiroyuki Tsuji, Takuya Okura, Rei Kawashima, Takuto Ogawa, Tomoyuki Miyashita

Small Satellite Conference

Formation flying of multiple small satellites is expected to enable novel space missions that cannot be achieved by a single satellite. Small sized satellites are strongly affected by environmental disturbances and have strict constraints on mass, volume, and power. This study focuses on characteristics that become prominent as satellites are miniaturized, such as the increased influence of space environment and enhanced interactions among onboard components. By utilizing these effects, the research aims to realize propellant-less, software-defined formation flying. The proposed technologies are applied to space MIMO (multiple input multiple output) communications, in which communication capacity is improved by controlling the …

Advancing Wavelet-Adaptive Interference Cancellation To Enable Cubesat Constellations For High-Fidelity Ac Magnetometry, Surya S. Kalluri, Alex P. Hoffmann, Mark B. Moldwin, James W. Cutler, Yethinder Ragav Lakshmi Kumar, Lauro V. Ojeda

Small Satellite Conference

Dense CubeSat constellations equipped with science-grade AC magnetometers offer a transformative path toward high spatial and temporal resolution of several magnetospheric phenomena that large spacecraft missions cannot resolve. Realizing this vision demands boomless magnetometry– due to deployment risks and resource constraints on nano/micro satellite platforms in large scale –capable of operating in the presence of intense spacecraft-generated electromagnetic interference without the spatial separation that conventional booms provide. This paper advances the characterization of the Wavelet-Adaptive Interference Cancellation for Underdetermined Platforms (WAIC-UP) algorithm across different frequency regimes and two distinct classes of test data. In the 50 Hz to 30 kHz …

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 …

Passive Thermal Imaging And Failure Detection Of Large-Area Space Structures Using Spin Crossover Composite Skins, Edward Pomianek, Codrin Tugui, Denise Maria De Andrade, Mihai Duduta

Small Satellite Conference

Deployable solar arrays are among the most failure-prone structures on spacecraft, and on small satellites their large area, low mass, and mechanical complexity make faults both more likely and harder to observe. Electrostatic discharge, string arcing, and localized hot spots can degrade or disable an array, yet the mass and harness penalties of distributed point sensors are difficult to accommodate within CubeSat resource budgets. This paper presents a passive, camera-readable sensing skin based on spin crossover (SCO) composite films that converts thermal events on a large-area structure into persistent optical information. The active material, [Fe(NH₂trz)₃]Br_{2 …}

An Ai-Enabled Ground Processing Pipeline For Image Restoration And Super-Resolution In 1u Cubesat Missions, Juan Bernardo Calabrese, Manuel Alejandro González Mendoza, Eduardo De La Vega Segura

Small Satellite Conference

The inaugural 1U CubeSat mission of Universidad Panamericana represents a shift in academic remote sensing, prioritizing ground-segment intelligence to overcome the physical and computational constraints of a 10-centimeter cubic form factor. Given strict power limitations, the satellite utilizes a low-cost, space-qualified XCAM C3D imaging system providing moderate-quality 1.3MP imagery with a ground sample distance (GSD) of approximately 360 meters at an altitude of 550 kilometers. To transform these raw frames into high-value Earth Observation products, this paper details an automated ground station framework hosting a modular image processing pipeline. The pipeline combines traditional image processing—including histogram equalization and edge enhancement—with …

Itasat2 Conceptual Architectural Design Of A Multi-Band Communication Framework For Distributed Cubesat Formation Operations, Renan Guilherme Soares Menezes, Edson Wander Do Rego Pereira, Bruno Leonardo Schuster, Pedro Casarin, Pedro Henrique Antero Lira, Luiz Fernando Da Cunha Silva, Matheus Esteves, Lidia Shibuya Sato, Ana Di Iorio, Luis Eduardo Vergueiro Loures Da Costa

Small Satellite Conference

The growing operational complexity of distributed CubeSat missions in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) demands communication architectures that provide robustness, responsiveness, and mission-level adaptability. The ITASAT2 mission, composed of three coordinated CubeSats operating in controlled relative motion, serves as a representative case to investigate how a multi-layer communication architecture can support formation flying, responsive maneuver planning, space situational awareness (SSA), distributed payload operations, and increasing levels of onboard autonomy within strict SWaP constraints. This paper proposes and analyzes a multi-band communication architecture designed to improve both operational resilience and communication responsiveness. The architecture combines a primary telemetry, tracking, and command (TT&C) …

Autonomous Reinforcement Learning Astrobee Control With Low Swap Neuromorphic Hardware, Kenneth Stewart, Roxana Leontie, Samantha Chapin, Joe Hays, Sumit Bam Shrestha, Carl Glen Henshaw

Small Satellite Conference

We present an end-to-end pipeline for deploying neural networks on low SWaP neuromorphic hardware to control a CubeSat like robot. As a test case, we use a reinforcement learning (RL)-trained Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs) on neuromorphic hardware by converting them into spiking Sigma-Delta Neural Networks (SDNNs) for controlling the NASA Astrobee free-flying robot, similar to a previously space-validated controller demonstrated on robotic hardware. We demonstrate that an ANN trained entirely in simulation can be transformed into an SDNN compatible with Intel’s Loihi 2 neuromorphic architecture, enabling low-latency and energy-efficient inference. The SDNN is deployed on Loihi 2, then evaluated in …

Whose Jesus? Which Christlikeness? On The Prospects Of Protestant Spiritual Formation, James K.A. Smith

University Faculty Publications and Creative Works

This article recounts the author’s path into the Protestant Spiritual Formation Movement (PSFM) as both a scholar and practitioner. The article then considers current challenges for Protestant Spiritual Formation, including environmental factors (political assimilation, pervasive distraction, and the couplet of anti-intellectualism and disinformation) and institutional challenges (the individualism of much of North American Protestantism and fragile educational networks). Given these contemporary challenges, the article proposes a strategic emphasis for the future of the PSFM: to articulate the criteria for Christian maturity (“Christlikeness”).

The Etsu Historian, Tyla Melkonyan

The ETSU Historian

No abstract provided.

Synthesis, Thermal Stability, And Ionic Conductivity Of Phenyl-Extended Viologen Ditriflate Salts: Tailoring Properties Via Oxyethylene Chain Length, Seonghyeok L. Cox, Emily Moon, Si L. Chen, David King, Haesook Han, Pradip K. Bhowmik, Calvin Ng Yi Bin, Thamil Selvi Velayutham, Alfonso Martinez-Felipe

Chemistry and Biochemistry Faculty Research

Six new phenyl-extended viologen salts with oxyethylene groups paired with triflate anions (OTF) have been synthesized using anionic ring-opening and ring-closing reactions (ANRORC) and metathesis reactions with LiOTf salts. The salts, which contain terminal oxyethylene chains of varying lengths ((CH₂CH₂O)_n, n = 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 7), are named PEOn-OTF. These materials exhibit a fluorescence response and possess high thermal stability, with processing windows up to approximately 300 °C, as confirmed by thermogravimetric analysis. While samples with short chain lengths (n = 1, 2, and 3) undergo crystallization observed …