Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Student-Made Satellite Goes Into Orbit

Posted by Zonk on from the all-i-did-in-college-was-play-video-games dept.

College Student writes "A Satellite built by aerospace students from 23 university groups successfully took off from Plesetsk, in northern Russia. From the article: 'A Russian booster rocket successfully carried a satellite designed by students into a low Earth orbit yesterday for the European Space Agency under a programme intended to help to inspire and train future aerospace workers.'"

11 of 77 comments (clear)

  1. Unfortunetly.... by dduardo · · Score: 5, Funny

    Some students made up some results and now the satellite is in the Pacific Ocean.

    1. Re:Unfortunetly.... by IO+ERROR · · Score: 3, Informative

      The satellite may well be in the Pacific Ocean. The ARRL is reporting the satellite went silent.

      The Student Space Exploration and Technology Initiative (SSETI) Express satellite, sent into orbit from Russia October 27, has gone silent. "We have not heard anything from Express on UHF since last night when the telemetry seemed to indicate a very negative power budget," Graham Shirville, G3VZV, said on the AMSAT BB as he was departing Russia following the launch. "If it does not recover then it will be a sad end to a wonderful mission." Shirville said ground controllers were going to attempt a blind command of the satellite this weekend in an effort to revive the satellite, which carries an Amateur Radio package and three CubeSat picosatellites. The spacecraft had been transmitting AX.25 telemetry at 9k6 bps on 437.250 MHz. Shortly after this week's launch, Shirville had reported the satellite was in nominal mode, producing 9k6 data bursts every 18 seconds. Plans call for the satellite will be turned into a single-channel amateur FM voice Mode U/S transponder after the transmitter serves initial telemetry duty.
      --
      How am I supposed to fit a pithy, relevant quote into 120 characters?
  2. Cal Poly was part of the launch by Nf1nk · · Score: 4, Informative

    http://littonlab.atl.calpoly.edu/
    The article was notibly short on details, so here is a link to one of the satellites in the launch. This was an impressive feat for the schools involved and much was learned from the process.

    --
    I used to have a cool sig, back when I cared
  3. Re:Cal Poly was part of the launch by Nf1nk · · Score: 4, Informative

    http://sseti.gte.tuwien.ac.at/express/mop/ This is the SSETI Express team home page.

    --
    I used to have a cool sig, back when I cared
  4. S-S-SETI? by jettoki · · Score: 5, Funny

    Student Space Exploration and Technology Initiative (SSETI) Express spacecraft...

    In other news, the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence (SETI) Institute has filed for damages under intergalactic copyright law, fearing that hostile alien intelligences may mistake the antics of college students for examples of actual human behavior; an error which would inevitably lead to the mercy-killing of our species.

  5. Science lead... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    As a kid I'd read a book about some high school students building model rockets. The final scene was one where they'd put a mouse (named "Maika" IIRC, in homage to Laika) into a rocket and brought it safely back to earth. There were books like "Encyclopedia Brown" and "Danny Dunn" -- many used science or education to solve problems.

    On a recent trek through a local Monstrous Book Store, I saw a different group of childrens' books... They talked about tolerance, religion, Barbie, single motherhood, Care Bears, Barney, Bratz... but scant few with scientists as the hero.

    In fact, I turn on the TV or rent a DVD, and scientists (and knowledge for that matter) has become the scapegoat for all the world's ills. Toxic spills create monsters. Scientists create doomsday machines. Researchers unleash deadly viruses. And some nice guy who doesn't have all that there book learnin' comes and rescues everyone.

    Now I'm not saying that movies should not be entertaining -- I enjoyed The Matrix not for its pseudo-mysticism but because of the cool fight scenes -- but please please please have a good guy scientist who gets the girl (or a good gal scientist who gets the guy) at least once a decade.

  6. Not to rain on their parade, but... by Razor+Sex · · Score: 3, Interesting

    this isn't a first by any means. Here at the University of Arizona, this is pretty common. I have a friend helping to build one of the next Mars orbiters, and students were also involved in builidng Spirit and Opportunity.

    1. Re:Not to rain on their parade, but... by CheshireCatCO · · Score: 3, Informative

      Yes, but they didn't design and build the thing themselves, they're effectively just technicians on the project. (Before you take offense, let me note that CU-Boulder builds a lot of instruments, too, and I had friends who worked on some of them. They're getting really good experience, but they're not responsible for the entire project.)

      There are other cases of student-designed/built/operated spacecraft, though: SNOE (Student Nitrous-Oxide Explorer) comes to mind. But NASA is *not* going to risk a Mars mission on students, though. It's too expensive.

    2. Re:Not to rain on their parade, but... by phliar · · Score: 3, Insightful
      this isn't a first by any means. ... I have a friend helping to build one of the next Mars orbiters, and students were also involved in builidng Spirit and Opportunity.
      This is "a satellite designed by students". Seems to me there's a teeny difference between "helping to build" (or "involved in") and "designed by".
      --
      Unlimited growth == Cancer.
  7. Re:Hey NASA, why not do this? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    NASA does do things like this. I'm a sophmore electrical engineering student at Utah State University and I'm helping with USU entry in the 4th University Nanosatellite Competition http://ususat.usu.edu/. Selected universities design, build, and test small satellites and the most useful and best designed gets launched at the end.

  8. Student Build Satellites are Nothing New by sstickeler · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Students have been building and launching satellites for some time. I worked on a purely student built satellite back in college in 1995 which was commissioned by Nasa: http://lasp.colorado.edu/snoe/overview.html