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Students Aim to Launch One of theSmallest Satellites EverBy Greg Clark

Staff Writerposted: 06:38 am ET12 January 2000

Seven years ago when engineering students at Arizona State University wanted to start a satellite program, they

enjoyed some early good fortune.

Aerospace engineering professor Helen Reed agreed instantly to help jump start a program that would allow studentsto design and build their own satellite. Reed, who would become the program's faculty advisor, realized the project

would be a tremendous benefit to the engineering curriculum, and she helped the students get industry support.

Reed arranged a meeting between students and Scott Webster, one of the co-founders of Orbital Sciences

Corporation -- the maker of small satellites and launch vehicles. Webster, too, was supportive, and issued the studentsa generous, if daunting, challenge: If students could design and build a satellite that was cheap, weighed less than 10

pounds and f it into a hatbox while being able to perform real science, Orbital Sciences would launch it as a hitchhiker

with a commercial payload.

With assurances that the most expensive part of the satellite mission would be

donated, the students organized and began an effort to build -- from scratch -- the

first nano-satellite ever launched. (Satellites are commonly classified by their mass. A

nano-satellite is defined as one that weighs between 2 and 22 pounds (1 and 10

kilograms).

Had the students been less eager, less determined, or less naive about what it would take to build the satellite, they

might not have accepted the challenge. Recalling Orbital Science's initial offer, Brian Underhill, a student who is now

program manager for the Arizona State University Satellite (ASUSAT) project said, "They said 'Yeah, we'll launch this

satellite that's basically impossible to build.'"

Most engineers the students sought for guidance said as much. The advice from professionals was that the students

could choose to meet a few of the design constraints, but it was futile to try to achieve them all, Underhill said.

The consensus from experts was, students could build a craft that was light and cheap, but it wouldn't be able to carry

out real science. Alternately, the experts said, students could make a lightweight satellite capable of doing real

science, but it would be too expensive to build because it would have to use exotic materials, and students wouldn't be

able to do the engineering, Underhill explained.

That didn't sway the group, though. Determined not to waste the promise of a free launch, and eager to build their own

orbiter, the students moved ahead -- but only into years of delays, dead-ends and mission re-designs.

Originally the students built a satellite in the 10-pound class that would measure the characteristics of small particles in

low-Earth orbit. It was tentatively scheduled for launch into a polar orbit to an altitude of 280 miles (450 kilometers),

nts Aim to Launch One of the Smallest Satellites Ever http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/technology/asusat_000

5/1/2010



but the customer paying for the primary-payload launch didn't want the student satellite aboard, and ASUSAT was left

behind.

The students then re-configured the satellite for another launch opportunity. Because the next orbit would be to a much

lower altitude, the team had to design and build another science experiment, but again, the ASU payload was bumpedfrom the launch manifest.

"We can't afford to pay for launch, so we were at the mercy of everybody," Underhill said.

The cycle of re-design and rejection continued for more than three years. Inside that time the students decided to

design a science payload that would not be orbit-dependent, one that would perform its function regardless of altitude.

They outfitted their satellite with cameras to perform an imaging mission. By this time the satellite was in its sixth

iteration. Then came a break.

The Air Force announced that it would carry university payloads aboard an experimental rocket it had contracted with

Orbital Sciences to develop. The rocket, which weds the two lower stages of surplus Minuteman intercontinental

ballistic missiles to the upper stages of Orbital Sciences' Pegasus launch vehicle, is part of the Orbital/Suborbital

Program, known as OSP-Minotaur -- an effort to use surplus rockets from Minuteman missiles for various purposes,

including launching space payloads into orbit.

Orbital Science's Scott Schoneman was the mission manager and lead engineer for the program, and also happened

to be working with the engineering students.

"I finally got my own launch with this OSP-Minotaur, and when it opened up to university payloads we were able to find

them a home," Schoneman said.

Last summer the satellite was integrated to the JAWSAT payload, weighing in at just under 13 pounds (8 kilograms).

Now -- after seven years of working around obstacles and delays, after more than 400 students have rotated through

the program -- the young engineers await the ASUSAT launch, f inally scheduled for Friday.

The student-built orbiter is unique not only for it's status as a nano-satellite. It stands out for its distinctive compositionand several one-of-a-kind student designs. The body of the spacecraft is made of a specialized composite material

that the students molded themselves. An all-composite design is still uncommon in the satellite industry, Schoneman

said, as most companies rely on heavier, old-fashioned metal to a great extent.

Students designed and built the instrument's sun sensors, designed the electronics circuit boards and wrote the

satellite's software codes. They even built a novel attitude-control system that should work to automatically keep the

spacecraft in a stable orientation with respect to Earth.

The satellite will prove new technology, but it also proves a good deal about improvisation.

"It proves you don't have to spend the high dollar to build these components," Underhill said. "Basically we didn't know

anything when we started - nobody did. We just studied up on what you really need to survive in a space environment

and did it ourselves."

Helen Reed, the faculty advisor who has been helping the students, said she notices a certain confidence in the

students who have been involved in the mission.

"I see the students really learning how to think through a problem because they must f ind a solution. The solution is not

in the back of the book," Reed said. "Here they have a problem, they have a variety of solutions, they must try to come

up with the best solution, so they're learning how to think critically and use all the tools that they have accumulated

over the course of their academic careers."

Students graduating with real, hands-on project experience are benefiting the industry too, Schoneman said.

"It's providing a good source of new employees who already have real practical experience in satellite business, as

well as some newer ideas to inject once they go into their professional careers. They help inject some of that ingenuity

into the companies that may hire them."

ILA 2010 - ConferenceSatellite-Based Communication Research and Development Spacewww.ila-berlin.de


5/1/2010



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Launch a nano satellite