| Jan 30, 2013 |
ESA is looking for the best student-built CubeSats to launch into space |
| (Nanowerk News) They fit in your hand, weigh no more than a bag of sugar, yet fly in space and perform experiments. They are CubeSats, a new generation of miniature satellites. Now, ESA is looking for the best student-built CubeSats to launch into space. |
| Send ESA your proposal by 1 March and your satellite could end up circling our planet. |
| Fly Your Satellite! is a new ESA initiative offering student teams the opportunity to design, build and eventually launch CubeSats into space. Besides the educational objective, each CubeSat may pursue a specific scientific or technical goal. |
| CubeSats are tiny. They may be as small as just 10 cm on all sides and weigh no more than a kilogram, yet they are packed with miniature electronics that allow them to operate as any larger satellite would. |
| Being so small, they cannot carry a large range of experiments and instruments but they can be invaluable training grounds for students who are thinking of following careers in the space field. |
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| Xatcobeo's final assembly |
| Tomorrow’s Europe will be run by today’s students. And Europe’s future is a place of increasing technology, brought into everyday usage to make our lives easier and more efficient. It is essential to train a skilled and confident workforce. |
| Fly Your Satellite! builds on the success of the ‘CubeSats for the Vega Maiden Flight’ pilot programme. This culminated last year with the launch of seven student-built CubeSats on the first flight of the new Vega launcher. |
| Some of Vega’s student CubeSats were firsts for their countries. In three cases – Romania, Hungary and Poland – the CubeSats were the first national satellites ever launched. All served different educational, technical or scientific aims. |
| Measuring the radiation environment in orbit, demonstrating innovative satellite control systems and testing a satellite deorbiting device were just some of the goals of the Vega CubeSats. |
| Each CubeSat team chosen for 2013’s Fly Your Satellite! must have similarly high aspirations. To earn their ticket to space, they must pass every stage of a rigorous assessment process, just as any of ESA’s largest missions are put through. This includes testing at ESA’s facilities. |
| During the development, ESA will work to identify an appropriate launch opportunity. |
| Source: ESA |
