Paper Category: Active Debris Removal
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OLAF: a Swarm of Microsatellites for Active Debris Removal by Space-based Laser Ablation
Small debris objects (1 mm–10 cm) pose a considerable risk to active spacecraft, potentially causing mission-critical damage as they can reach relative impact velocities of 15 km/s in LEO. ESA’s latest Space Environment Report estimates more than 130 million objects in this size range residing in LEO, the majority of which cannot be tracked by…

