December 8. /TASS/. Members of an association of Russian universities and scientific organizations approved the projects of the first three nanosatellites of the future orbital consortium created within the consortium. The satellites will help in the study of the ionosphere, the development of the Arctic and Antarctic, the identification of sea vessels, the press service of the Samara National Research University said on Tuesday.
"This is a very important event for us. After this stage, after the public presentation of the projects, we move directly to the stage of manufacturing nanosatellites. We'll give a year for the implementation of this stage — so that by the end of 2021 the satellites will be fully ready, and so that in 2022 they could be launched into space ", the press service quotes Professor Igor Belokonov, the organizer of the consortium meeting, head of the interuniversity department of space research at Samara University.
A consortium of Russian universities and scientific organizations to create a constellation of nanosatellites for studying the Earth's ionosphere was set up in 2018. The initiative to create the consortium belongs to Samara University.
The idea of uniting leading Russian universities for joint research of the ionosphere was supported by Roscosmos, the Institute of Applied Geophysics of Roshydromet, and the Space Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The consortium includes nine universities, two small companies and the Institute of Physics of the Earth of Russian Academy of Sciences.
In addition to the Samara University, the consortium includes Siberian State University of Science and Technology, Amur State University, Omsk State Technical University, Izhevsk State Technical University (Kalashnikov), Ulyanovsk State University, Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University, Ural Federal University, Southern Federal University.
Upper ionosphere research and other tasks
According to the presented project, the SamSat-ION scientific and educational nanosatellite developed at Samara University will assist scientists in conducting tomography of the upper ionosphere, studying wave processes and studying plasma during its work in orbit. On board the created experimental gravitational-aerodynamic nanosatellite platform, there will be a navigation receiver, a remote magnetometer on a rod of an original design and a plasma parameter sensor jointly developed by Samara University and the Institute of Applied Physics of the Russian Academy of Sciences, which makes it possible to measure the characteristics of plasma in orbit.
SamSat-ION ground tests will be conducted at Samara University Nanosatellite Testing and Development Center. At the same time, a separate prototype of a nanosatellite will be created for ground-based experimental development, which, in particular, will pass through a thermal vacuum chamber, a robot manipulator, vibrodynamic and magnetic stands, as well as a simulator of the Sun.
At the stage of SamSat-ION flight design tests, the results of research carried out within the framework of a joint grant of the Russian Foundation for Basic Research and the Belarusian Foundation for Basic Research "Theoretical Foundations of Investigation of Wave Processes and Phenomena in the Ionosphere Using Signals from Satellite Radio Navigation Systems" — the first joint scientific project of Russia and Belarus implemented at Samara University.
The Samara nanosatellite is supposed to be launched into a solar synchronous orbit with an altitude of about 550 km. According to the calculations of scientists, the life of a satellite in such an orbit could be about 19 years.
The projects of satellites from St. Petersburg are made on a single multipurpose platform "Synergy", which is based on the block-modular principle.
"The Astronomicon laboratory and the St. Petersburg Polytechnic University cooperate very closely, and a unified satellite platform will be used to create their two nanosatellites. The satellites will differ in additional equipment, additional payload for solving various applied problems," Belokonov said.
According to him, a receiver of an automatic identification system for monitoring sea vessels will be installed on the satellite of the Polytechnic University, called Polytechnic-ION, and equipment for testing the radiation resistance of various element base will be placed on the HeckStek astronomical satellite.
Like Samara's SamSat-ION, the Polytechnic-ION and HeckStek satellites will study plasma along their flight path and carry out tomography of the upper ionosphere. The data obtained, according to scientists, will be useful in meteorology and in solving problems for the further development of the Arctic and Antarctic.