Sponsors + Partner Organizations
We are very thankful for the following organizations for making this summer’s program possible!
STARLITE
Superluminous Tomographic Atmospheric Reconstruction with Laser-beacons for Imaging Terrestrial Exoplanets
In the search for life in our galaxy, and for understanding the origins of our solar system, the direct imaging and characterization of earth-like exoplanets is key. In a step towards achieving these goals, STARLITE uses five CubeSats in a highly elliptical orbit as artificial guide stars to augment the power of current and next-generation extremely-large ground-based telescopes. These guidestars will enable tomographic reconstruction of the atmosphere for extreme multi-conjugate adaptive optics (MCAO).
The STARLITE constellation at its ~350,000km apogee will provide -3 magnitude artificial guide stars from a 10cm launching telescope in a sub-arcminute field of view for up to an hour. Careful selection and design of the 755nm on-board laser will allow O2 detection and characterization of exoplanet atmospheres. At a size of 12U, each satellite weighs only 32kg and utilizes mostly commercially available off-the-shelf parts to keep costs per satellite around $2M. In this paper we will present the satellite mission concept and early 3D system design for the STARLITE constellation.
STARLITE shall provide around 200 observational opportunities in a 2:1 Moon resonant HEO over its 5 year lifetime: that’s 200 opportunities to detect and characterize exoplanets that could have earth-like qualities.
Key Objectives:
- Demonstrate that tomographic reconstruction and MCAO is improved with orbiting laser beacons
- Directly detect exoplanets within the habitable zones of their host stars
- Characterize the composition of detected exoplanets in VIS-NIR and search for biomarkers.
STARLITE Spacecraft
Each STARLITE guidestar consists of a 12U CubeSat that weighs around 25kg (for a total of 125kg). They are individually powered by two solar arrays that will be deployed during the commission phase to provide sufficient power for all onboard subsystems. The spacecraft bus will house the two science instruments.
- Weight: <40kg/satellite (with margin of 48kg)
- Dimensions: 16U
- Main structural components of the satellite:
- 3x Reaction wheels: = ~150 W (3x 50 W, ex. Rocket Lab RW-1.0)
- Primary ion thruster = ~1800 W (ex. Butek BHT-1500, or 2100W NASA Next-C)
- Attitude control thrusters 8x = ~240 W (8x 30 W) d.
- Onboard telemetry = ~20 W (ex. GDM Sentinel M-code GPS receiver)
- Sensors: 1 Inertial reference Unit = ~5 W (ex. Honeywell HG1900 IMU)
- Battery= ~256 Whr (ex. SLC-21060-003)
- Note: if we do the 20W laser option we may need more powerful equipment for pointing. We think a 20W laser may cost 200W to run power-wise, but we need to verify that. Total currently: ~2415/3000. (20% margin
Main Scientific Objectives of the Mission
Potential Science Goals Identified from 2022 NASA Strategic Plan: Objective 1.2
- Understand the Sun, solar system, and universe.
- Searching for Life Elsewhere
- Improve the knowledge of environmental requirements for habitability
- Develop tools for detecting life
- Develop tools for determining the relative habitability of present orancient environments