Paper Category: Technology
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Semi-Autonomous Reconnaissance Satellite: A Laboratory Demonstration of End-to-End On-Board Mission Autonomy
Real-time satellite responsiveness to user requests from the field remains largely unavailable in current space systems. Such capabilities are typically restricted to low-altitude airborne platforms, primarily due to limited satellite communication bandwidth, intermittent ground contact, and the reliance on ground-based mission planning. Enabling true responsiveness requires a paradigm shift toward highly autonomous satellites, in which…
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Quantum Key Distribution for Secure LEO Satellite Constellations: A Scalable Protocol and Deployment Model
As global reliance on satellite communication networks intensifies, securing data links in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) becomes critical. Quantum Key Distribution (QKD), particularly the BB84 protocol, offers provably secure encryption through the transmission of quantum states. However, practical deployment at constellation scale poses challenges, including limited pass durations over ground stations, atmospheric attenuation, and the…
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Air-Bearing-Based Evaluation of Reaction Wheel Micro-Vibrations and Their Impact on Small Satellite Pointing Stability
High-performance imaging satellite missions require exceptional pointing stability to ensure image quality and geometric fidelity. This stability is often degraded by micro-vibrations originating from reaction wheels, which propagate through the spacecraft structure and induce line-of-sight (LoS) jitter. Although force-torque measurements are commonly used to characterise these disturbances at component level, relating them to spacecraft-level pointing…
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Enabling Secure Maritime Connectivity: MAIV of the MICE-1 CubeSat Mission
The increasing reliance of Maritime IoT and Internet of Vessels (IoV) applications on satellite connectivity places stringent requirements not only on system architecture and communications performance, but also on the robustness, manufacturability, and verification of spaceborne platforms operating in demanding environments. In this context, nanosatellite missions targeting maritime services must balance tight mass, volume, and…
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Decentralized Operational Framework for Autonomous Space Traffic Management in High-Drag VLEO Environments
The rapid expansion of Very Low Earth Orbit (VLEO) constellations introduces significant complexities in orbital maintenance due to non-conservative forces, primarily stochastic atmospheric drag. Traditional centralized Space Traffic Management (STM) architectures, which rely on batch-processed updates and human-in-the-loop decision making, are increasingly incapable of managing the high-frequency station-keeping maneuvers required in these altitudes. This paper…
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Numerical Performance Evaluation of FGM Spacecraft Panels under Hypervelocity Debris Impact
Orbital space debris in LEO poses a systemic integrity concern to satellites’ structure and requires higher levels of passive shielding beyond traditional Whipple shield configurations. This paper presents an investigation of the impact tolerance of Functionally Graded Material sandwich panels subjected to hypervelocity impact phenomena under a non-linear computational framework. A comparison of an Al7075-T6…
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Evaluation of Heterogeneous Data Fusion for Real-Time Agricultural Stress Monitoring in Small-Scale Farming Ecosystems
Smallholder agricultural systems represent a critical frontier for climate resilience strategies, yet they are often underserved by traditional remote sensing frameworks due to fragmented land parcels and low-frequency reporting. This research investigates an autonomous geospatial framework designed to synthesize multi-source satellite data, specifically Sentinel-2 MSI optical imagery and CHIRPS precipitation datasets, to detect and characterize…
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ALIGN Mission: Radio Intersatellite Link Feasibility Demonstration for Hybrid Free-Space Optical Communications
The ALIGN (Autonomous Laser-based Intersatellite Gigabit Network) mission comprises a pair of 6U CubeSats equipped with FOCUS (Free-space Optical Communications Unit for Space), an experimental payload demonstrating high-data-rate optical intersatellite links in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) and advanced hybrid optical/radio intersatellite communications. Each satellite implements a dual RF-link architecture: the Radio Ground-to-Satellite Link (RGSL) for…
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Optimisation of Star Tracker Orientation and Attitude Trajectories for Space-To-Ground Optical Communication on CubeSats
Optical communication systems promise a step-change in data return capability for CubeSats but introduce exceptionally demanding pointing requirements. In some cases, sub-milliradian level pointing of the satellite is required to successfully acquire a laser signal from the ground. This is further complicated by the relatively high angular velocities and angular accelerations of the satellite-to-ground target…
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Strengthening SmallSat Missions with Trusted Computing: Practical Paths for Cybersecurity, Interoperability and Supply Chain Assurance
As small satellite missions mature and scale, cybersecurity and digital trust are increasingly critical across spacecraft, ground systems, and supply chains. Trusted computing, long established in other critical infrastructure sectors, remains relatively unfamiliar within the satellite community but is gaining momentum through the growing adoption and evolution of Trusted Platform Modules (TPMs). This trend reflects…