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Published June 2016 | Published
Journal Article Open

On Development of 100-Gram-Class Spacecraft for Swarm Applications

Abstract

A novel space system architecture is proposed, which would enable 100-g-class spacecraft to be flown as swarms (100 s-1000 s) in low Earth orbit. Swarms of Silicon Wafer Integrated Femtosatellites (SWIFT) present a paradigm-shifting approach to distributed spacecraft development, missions, and applications. Potential applications of SWIFT swarms include sparse aperture arrays and distributed sensor networks. New swarm array configurations are introduced and shown to achieve the effective sparse aperture driven from optical performance metrics. A system cost analysis based on this comparison justifies deploying a large number of femtosatellites for sparse aperture applications. Moreover, this paper discusses promising guidance, control, and navigation methods for swarms of femtosatellites equipped with modest sensing and control capabilities.

Additional Information

© 2016 IEEE. Date of Publication: 20 August 2014. The research was carried out in part at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under a contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. ©2013 California Institute of Technology. Government sponsorship acknowledged. The SWIFT Swarm Project team includes David Bayard, Ed Mettler, Behchet Acikmese, Lars Blackmore, Milan Mandic, Marco Quadrelli, Risaku Toda, Eduardo Urgiles, Thor Wilson, Mohammad Mojarradi, Don Hunter, Ryan Kinnet, Dhak Muthulingam, Colleen Maresse-Reading, Sohrab Mobasser, Charles Bergh, John Zimer at JPL; Daniel Morgan at UIUC; and Raman Mehra at Scientific Systems Company, Inc.

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August 20, 2023
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