Nicholas Blazier, Sandia National Laboratories, Samuel Tarin, Sandia National Laboratories, Mitchell Wells, Sandia National Laboratories, Nathanael Brown, Sandia National Laboratories, Prabal Nandy, Sandia National Laboratories, Drew Woodbury, Sandia National Laboratories
Keywords: Autonomous telescope, geosynchronous characterization, sohbrit
Abstract:
As technology continues to improve, driving down the cost of commercial astronomical products while increasing their capabilities, manpower to run observations has become the limiting factor in acquiring continuous and repeatable space situational awareness data. Sandia National Laboratories set out to automate a testbed comprised entirely of commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) hardware for space object characterization (SOC) focusing on satellites in geosynchronous orbit. Using an entirely autonomous system allows collection parameters such as target illumination and nightly overlap to be accounted for habitually; this enables repeatable development of target light curves to establish patterns of life in a variety of spectral bands.
Date of Conference: September 19-22, 2017
Track: Poster