Doris Grosse, Australian National University; Francis Bennet, Australian National University; Michael Copeland, Australian National University; Marcus Birch, Australian National University ; Tony Travouillon, Autralian National University; Jamie Soon, Australian National University; Christian Wolf, Australian National University; Christopher Onken, Australian National University
Keywords: Detection and Tracking; Infrared sensors; SSA; SDA;
Abstract:
With ever rising amounts of satellites and debris in orbit, tracking capabilities need to be increased and upgraded on a global scale to keep up with the continuous growth of objects to be tracked in orbit. It is important to have more sensors distributed all over the world to support space traffic management (STM) and space situational awareness (SSA) efforts. Also needed is a variety of sensors with different capabilities accommodating the different characteristics of different satellites in different orbits, so that different features of satellites can be measured.
Telescope facilities solely dedicated for the purpose of STM and SSA are expensive to build and mostly not yet commercially viable, especially when new techniques are being developed to improve detection and extent tracking times.
The Australian National University has identified how their existing and future optical telescopes can be repurposed for space situational awareness and is putting considerable effort into implementing SSA detection and tracking capability into established and newly developed facilities.
We are presenting three optical telescope facilities in this paper and show how their capability can be harnessed for SSA applications:
SkyMapper, an already established optical telescope dedicated to a Southern Sky Survey in the visible, but also capable of geostationary satellite detection; This is a 1.3 m class wide-field telescope originally designed to conduct astronomical surveys and is therefore capable of detecting satellites and debris in its field of view.
the Dynamic REd All-sky Monitoring Survey (DREAMS) telescope suitable for satellite detection in low Earth orbit in the short wave infrared (SWIR); The DREAMS telescope is a 0.5 m astronomical telescope that is capable of detecting low Earth orbit objects and performing follow up tracking.
The third telescope is a 0.7 m class telescope situated in an optical communications ground station dedicated to develop and operate satellite laser communication technology, but also capable to host a satellite detection and tracking service.
In this paper, we provide an overview of the capabilities of the above described telescopes. We showcase detection performance for SkyMapper who has been in operation for astronomical purposes since 2014, provide an update on the installation and expected tracking performance with the DREAMS telescope which is scheduled to be commissioned in the first half of 2023 and provide an overview on the status of the optical communications ground station and its planned SSA capability.
Date of Conference: September 27-20, 2022
Track: Optical Systems & Instrumentation