• Aerospace Engineering and Technology
• /
• v.13 no.2
• /
• pp.73-79
• /
• 2014

During developing cubesat flight software, Communication test between cubesat and ground station is needed. For this, we have constructed indoor ground station without outdoor antenna for decreasing total cost and time. In this time, if output power of ground station is high, it will affect for cubesat transceiver to be fail. For solving this problem, ground station must be designed for output power of it to be lower than input power of cubesat satellite, and it must be verified. In this paper, first, we describe cubesat indoor ground station using UHF and VHF. Second, we describe output power decreasing test for indoor operation of ground station by attaching attenuators in the end of the output connector.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences
• /
• v.43 no.5
• /
• pp.413-421
• /
• 2015

Since the first Cubesat was launched in 2003, there have been more than 230 Cubesats launched so far. Due to their small size and lightweight, Cubesats were launched by utilizing the empty space of regular launch vehicle. However, this launch method has a weakness that has been easily affecting by the schedule of major payloads. As a new solution to this problem, it has been proposed that a robot arm installed on ISS would be used to launch Cubesats. The orbits of Cubesat deployed from the ISS in various angles and directions are analyzed in this paper. We also analyze the possibility of collision between the Cubesat and ISS within the operational orbit of the CubeSat and eventually calculate the optimal angle of a robot arm, which maximizes the lifetime of Cubesat and minimizes the risk of collision between the Cubesat and ISS.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences
• /
• v.45 no.11
• /
• pp.975-988
• /
• 2017

Since 2000, about 750 cubesats have been launched as of August 2017 and development and the launch of cubesat increased exponentially. Since standard of cubesat has been proposed in 1999, cubesats have grown considerably beyond the scope of education and technology verification to commercial use in the area of space exploration and earth observation, and the variety of cubesat mission and type has increased recently. In Korea, some universities and individuals have independently developed cubesats since 2000, and cubesat contests which were organized by KARI and sponsored by Ministry of Science and ICT from 2012 highly contributed to cubesat development in Korea. In addition, domestic institutes such as KARI, KASI started to develop cubesats for space science and exploration mission. Nineteen cubesats have been progressed or completed in development until now. In this paper, we present the technical trend and describe all cubesats in Korea.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences
• /
• v.44 no.4
• /
• pp.298-307
• /
• 2016

Attitude determination of satellite is categorized by deterministic and recursive method. The recursive algorithm using Kalman filter is widely used. Cubesat has limitation for payload to minimize then only two attitude sensors are installed which are sun sensor and magnetometer. Sun sensor measurements are useless during eclipse, however cubesat keeps estimating attitude to complete the successful mission. In this paper, Attitude determination algorithm based on Kalman filter is developed by additional term which considering the dynamics for SNUSAT-1 with disturbance torque. Verification of attitude accuracy of the algorithm is conducted during eclipse. Attitude determination algorithm is simulated to compare the performance between typical method and proposed algorithm. In addition, Attitude errors are analysed with various magnitude of disturbance torque caused by space environment.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences
• /
• v.45 no.8
• /
• pp.686-696
• /
• 2017

The major objective of this study is to develop and verify the KAUSAT-5 based on the modular 3U CubeSat standard platform. In the mechanical system design of a 3U standard platform, subsystem and micro equipment functions/performance should be integrated and miniaturized on micro-sized PCBs and electrical capability was maximized to accommodate multiple payloads. KAUSAT-5 is 3U-sized Cubesat which will be operated in Low Earth Orbit(LEO), which implements mainly two scientific missions; one is to observe the Earth through infrared camera and the other is to measure space radiation with a Geiger Muller tube. An additional mission is to verify the equipment(device) such as VSCMG and fuzzy logic-based MPPT internally developed. The results of ETB, qualification and acceptance level environmental tests were shown to verify standard platform and KAUSAT-5 Cubesat.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences
• /
• v.44 no.2
• /
• pp.172-180
• /
• 2016

A cubesat classified as a pico-satellite typically uses commercial-grade components that satisfy the vibration and thermal environmental specifications and goes into mission orbit even after undergoing minimum environment tests due to their lower cost and short development period. However, its reliability exposed to the physical environment such as on-orbit thermal vacuum for long periods cannot be assured under minimum tests criterion. In this paper, we have analysed the reliability and life prediction of the failure mechanisms of the cubesat mission board during its service life under the launch and on-orbit environment by using the sherlock software which has been widely used in automobile fields to predict the reliability of electronic devices.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences
• /
• v.44 no.4
• /
• pp.363-372
• /
• 2016

SIGMA(Scientific cubesat with Instruments for Global Magnetic field and rAdiation) CubeSat has been developed for magnetic field measurement of the Earth and space radiation measurement at Kyung Hee university. The flight software plays important roles in controlling the satellite and processing the data in the space mission. In this paper, the Flight Software has been implemented to process all the tasks in the one thread without RTOS(Real Time Operating System). This is an effective mothed not only to concentrate the space mission of CubeSat but also to reduce the overhead of the Flight Software by considering the mission perform procedures and the system control methods.

• Journal of Aerospace System Engineering
• /
• v.14 no.3
• /
• pp.51-59
• /
• 2020

In the case of cubesat, a PCB-based deployable solar panel advantageous in terms of weight reduction and electrical circuit design is widely used considering the limited weight and volume of satellites. However, because of the low thermal conductivity of PCB, there is a limit relative to heat dissipation. In this paper, the thermal gap pad is applied to the contact between the PCB-based solar panel and the aluminum stiffener mounted on the outside of the panel. Thus, the heat transfer from the solar cell to the rear side of the panel is facilitated. It maximizes the heat dissipation performance while maintaining the merits of PCB panel, and thus, it is possible to improve the power generation efficiency from reducing the temperature of the solar cell. The effectiveness of the thermal design of the 6U cubesat's deployable solar panel using the thermal gap pad has been verified through on-orbit thermal analysis based on the results, compared with the conventional PCB-based solar panel.

• Journal of Space Technology and Applications
• /
• v.1 no.1
• /
• pp.76-84
• /
• 2021

Because solar panels of normal satellites are faced to the sun, the power generation by the Earth Albedo is almost neglected in satellite's power analysis. However, many cubesats don't have deployable solar panels and in this case the Earth Albedo is not negligible because solar panels are in six sides facing different directions. In this paper, we calculated satellite's power generation by the Earth Albedo. We divided the Earth's surface into grids based on polar coordinate system. We modeled power generation in each solar cell by reflection on these grids. We simulated 1 U cubesat which flies in sun synchronous orbit and 500 km altitude so that we calculated satellite's power generation by the Earth Albedo.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences
• /
• v.49 no.12
• /
• pp.1027-1035
• /
• 2021

We presents a design of 3U cubesat MIMAN (Monochrome imaging for monitoring aerosol by nano-satellite) for aerosol monitoring mission with high spatial resolution. The main objective of MIMAN mission is to take images of aerosols around Korea and to provide auxiliary data for GK 2B cloud masking. For this mission, we derived mission requirements and constraints for the MIMAN mission. We designed the mission architecture and concept of operations. To reduce risk factors in space operation, we considered the safety of the communication. In every operation modes, UHF communication is available so that the cubesat can operate based on the ground commands. So, we can handle every problem at the ground station during mission operations. Based on the mission and concept of operations, we confirmed that the system design satisfied the system requirements. We designed the system interface considering data flow of each hardware, and evaluated the safety of the system with system budget analysis.