ORCASat, which launched Thursday from the International Space Station, will serve as an orbiting reference light source that will be viewable by telescopes on Earth.
The final phase of a satellite’s journey, a journey that began at the University of Victoria, took place on Thursday when it was deployed into orbit from the International Space Station.
“You can feel the excitement with today’s deployment,” said Tony Pellerin, manager of space science and technology at the Canadian Space Agency. “There was a rush to make contact with the satellite and another wave of excitement when it was successful.”
The satellite, which is about the size of a two-liter milk carton, represents four years of work by dozens of full-time researchers, co-op students and volunteers from UVic Satellite Design, UBC Orbit and Simon Fraser University Satellite Design .
The satellite, called ORCASat, short for Optical Reference Calibration Satellite (and a not-so-subtle nod to the region of Canada where it was made), is intended to serve as an orbiting reference light source that can be seen with telescopes in the earth. .
Using two laser light sources, the satellite measures the amount of light emitted by an astronomical object. This allows ground-based telescopes to be calibrated to measure the absolute brightness of an astronomical object, not as it appears after passing through the atmosphere and telescope optics.
It is the first satellite that carries a light source capable of performing the experiment with this level of precision.
“It’s certainly not easy to make a satellite, and the No. 1 goal of the Canadian CubeSat project, which started in 2017, was to train students,” Pellerin said. “In that sense, the mission was successful even before it was deployed today.”
The space agency selected 15 universities, with grants of up to $250,000, to fund the CubeSat project across the country. Following Thursday’s success, similar launches are expected in March and June.
The aim of the project is to give secondary institutions the opportunity to involve students in a space mission, with experts to guide them.
“There is an opportunity for every university in the country to get involved.”
The satellite has been placed in an orbit 400 kilometers around the Earth (called a low orbit), traveling at 7.5 kilometers per second.
As the orbits decay, it will get closer and closer and is expected to deorbit in about a year “if we’re lucky,” burning up in the atmosphere and leaving no debris.
parrais@timescolonist.com