InterCubeSat Communications and Operations

There are multiple advantages to communicating between spacecraft. As CubeSat missions become more automated, constellations could exchange information to maintain precise positions without input from the ground. Data can be relayed between spacecraft to increase the coverage from limited ground stations. Finally, inter-CubeSat transponders may very well become a vital element of eventual deep space missions, since CubeSats are typically limited in broadcasting power due to their small size and may be better suited to relay information to Earth via a larger, more powerful mothership.

Though transponders are well established in the spacecraft world, networked swarms of CubeSats that pass information amongst each other and then eventually to ground, have yet to be demonstrated. Developing networked swarms is less of a hardware engineering problem than a systems and software engineering problem, as demonstrated by NASA Ames Research Center’s Edison Demonstration of Smallsat Networks (EDSN) mission (Hanson, Chartres, Sanchez, & Oyadomari, 2014), Figure 9.14. Unfortunately, the eight small satellites that comprise the EDSN mission were lost due to launch failure. Ames’ follow up, the two 1.5 U Network &

Figure 9.13: Scheme for using land-based laser to transmit data from CubeSat using on-board MRR. Image courtesy of Salas (2012).

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Operations Demonstration Satellites (Nodes), deployed from the ISS in 2016. The Nodes mission will be an opportunity to complete some of the tasks set forth in the EDSN mission. Similarly, the CubeSat Proximity Operations Demonstration (CPOD) mission, led by Tyvak NanoSatellite Systems, Inc., “will demonstrate rendezvous, proximity operations and docking using two 3U CubeSats” (National Aeronautics and Space Administration, 2013).

Engineers from NASA Marshall Space Flight Center are also developing inter-CubeSat communication using a peer-to-peer topology. The mesh network architecture is designed to allow for the exchange of telemetry and other data between spacecraft with no central router (Becker, 2017). Clyde Space is in the early stages of its ambitious project called the Outernet, a low-cost, mass-producible constellation of 1U CubeSats that will provide a near continuous broadcast of humanitarian data to those in need (Anderson & Karim, 2016).

9.4

Summary

There is already strong flight heritage for many UHF/VHF and S-band communication systems for CubeSats. Less common, but with growing flight heritage, are X-band systems. Higher RF frequencies and laser communication already have CubeSats flight heritage, but with limited (or yet to be demonstrated) performance. Ka-band systems for CubeSats are currently in development, but TRL status is still relatively low. On the other hand, laser communication is a spaceflight ready technology that should see future onboard laser systems with increased performance. Alternatively, a few groups are working on asymmetric laser communication, but this is still a relatively low TRL technology.

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Figure 9.14: Scheme for inter-CubeSat communication for EDSN mission. Image courtesy of NASA.

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10.0 Integration, Launch, and Deployment