[IP] First student satellite built by EC students lifts off
Begin forwarded message:
From: Dewayne Hendricks <dewayne@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: October 27, 2005 7:01:34 AM EDT
To: Dewayne-Net Technology List <dewayne-net@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [Dewayne-Net] First student satellite built by EC students
lifts off
Reply-To: dewayne@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
First student satellite lifts off
The first satellite built entirely by European students has launched
from Plesetsk in northern Russia.
The 52 kg micro-satellite, Sseti Express, was designed and built by
100 students from 10 universities in nine countries.
It blasted off aboard a Russian Cosmos 3M rocket in the first launch
from the cosmodrome since the loss of Europe's ice mission, Cryosat.
Sseti Express shared a ride with satellites for China, Iran and the UK.
Graham Shirville, who masterminded the telecommunications side of the
project, said it was essentially a demonstration payload.
"It's the first European-built satellite that has been built largely
by using the internet as communication between the teams," he said.
"The prime purpose is to demonstrate that students, with assistance
from an organisation like the European Space Agency, can design and
build a satellite well-enough constructed to be flown with other
passengers."
Moonlander project
The satellite is the first mission of the Student Space Exploration
and Technology Initiative (Sseti).
In conjunction with the European Space Agency (Esa), which funds the
project, the students hope to construct and launch several micro-
satellites and potentially more complex projects such as a moonlander.
Sseti Express carries a camera to take images of the Earth and three
tiny "cubesats" to carry out experiments. It will also act as a
transponder to relay amateur radio signals.
"The main objective of this mission is not what happens in space, it
is the educational objective - to enhance the literacy and motivation
of European students for space engineering and space science,"
project manager Neil Melville of Esa's education department told the
BBC News website.
Other passengers
Sseti Express shares a ride into space with China's Beijing-1
microsatellite built in the UK by Surrey Satellite Technology.
Beijing-1 carries the China Mapping Telescope, a very powerful high-
resolution instrument build by UK scientists at Sira, instrumentation
and measurement experts, to map and photograph Chinese territory.
It will help plan projects associated with the 2008 Beijing Olympics
and monitor and manage natural as well as man-made disasters.
Also on board are a satellite built by Russia for Iran, and Topsat,
an Earth observation microsatellite funded by the UK government.
Story from BBC NEWS:
<http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/sci/tech/4375986.stm>
Published: 2005/10/27 07:57:25 GMT
Weblog at: <http://weblog.warpspeed.com>
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