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[jamsat-news:3065] ANS-099 AMSAT News Service Weekly Bulletins
AMSAT NEWS SERVICE
ANS-099
ANS is a free, weekly, news and information service of AMSAT North America, The
Radio Amateur Satellite Corporation. ANS reports on the activities of a
worldwide group of Amateur Radio operators who share an active interest in
designing, building, launching and communicating through analog and digital
Amateur Radio satellites.
Please send any amateur satellite news or reports to:
ans-editor@amsat.org
**********************************************************************
* Volunteers are needed to help at the AMSAT booth at Dayton. Gould *
* WA4SXM, is looking for volunteers to help man the AMSAT booth dur- *
* ing the 2012 Hamvention. People are needed all 3 days for 2 hour *
* shifts. Please send the days and times you are available to help *
* as well as how many shifts you are willing to work via e-mail to *
* wa4sxm at amsat.org. *
* Monitor http://www.amsat.org/amsat-new/hamvention/2012/Dayton.php *
* for the latest AMSAT at Dayton news and developments *
**********************************************************************
In this edition:
* Fox-1 Project Educational Goals Align With NASA ELaNa Requirements
* AMSAT-NA Board of Directors Nominations
* EPFL Announces Nanosat Ion Drive - To The Moon on 100 mL of Fuel
* European ATV-3 Edoardo Amaldi Arrives at ISS & Performs Reboost
* California Students Contact ISS Astronaut
* Satellite Shorts From All Over
SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-099.01
ANS-099 AMSAT News Service Weekly Bulletins
AMSAT News Service Bulletin 099.01
From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
April 8, 2012
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-099.01
Fox-1 Project Educational Goals Align With NASA ELaNa Requirements
Project ELaNa, NASA's "Educational Launch of NanoSat" managed by the
Launch Services Program at the Kennedy Space Center, announced on
February 10 that the AMSAT Fox-1 cubesat has been selected to join
the program. AMSAT will work with NASA in a collaborative agreement
where NASA will cover the integration and launch costs of satellites
deemed to have merit in support of their strategic and educational
goals.
In an article published in the AMSAT Journal, AMSAT Vice-President
of Engineering, Tony Monteiro, AA2TX noted that meeting NASA's edu-
cational goals for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM)
was the cornerstone in the successful acceptance of Fox-1 into the
ELaNa project.
Fox-1 continues AMSAT's long record of success as an all-volunteer
organization providing access to space communications for students
in a curriculum setting as well the private citizen.
The Fox-1 communication package provides a learning and techologi-
cal stepping-stone using commonly available amateur radio equipment.
Students gain first-hand experience in setting up and operating equip-
ment, orbital prediction, communication to distant places, and growth
in overall space literacy. In the classroom, Fox-1 will allow schools,
teachers, and students to actively participate in space technology
with a unique experimental hands-on learning approach that includes
communicating through a satellite in orbit.
All of the Fox-1 experiment and telemetry data will be collected and
stored on our internet server and made publicly available for use in
the classroom and shared with the CubeSat community.
In addition to mentoring university student cubesat mission teams,
AMSAT satellites have also hosted university experiments aboard our
spacecraft. In addition to the communications package, Fox-1 will
host an experimental payload developed as a capstone project at Penn
State University. The Penn State project will have impact on future
CubeSat systems as the students design, construct, and orbit an atti-
tude experiment based on a 3-axis micro-electro-mechanical gyroscope.
Fox-1 Project Reviews
---------------------
The Fox-1 Team participated in a Merit Review and Feasibility Review
with a panel including education and industry experts at the Doctorate
level, a developer of 29 satellites, and directors of research.
The results of the Fox-1 Merit Review found:
+ AMSAT "nailed" the NASA education requirements of the NASA Educa-
tion Strategic Coordination Framework and the NASA Education Imple-
mentation Framework. In fact, AMSAT has a history of space education
that pre-dates most university programs.
+ The Fox-1 program will be accessible to an entire classroom or
school with only the teacher or outside volunteer requiring an
amateur radio license.
+ The archive of telemetry data collected during actual space flight
will prove valuable in future educational projects that have yet
to be imagined.
The results of the Fox-1 Feasibility Review found:
+ While AMSAT relies on an all-volunteer development team the tre-
mendous depth and experience of the Fox-1 team far exceeds the
capability of a typical CubeSat team. AMSAT has developed its
satellites this way for 40 years and has never missed a launch.
+ AMSAT does not rely on critical technology for flight and leverages
our experience from prior successful missions:
o Fox-1 is designed to operate in sunlight without batteries
once the battery system fails. This applies lessons learned
from AO-51 and ARISSat-1 operations.
o In case of IHU failure Fox-1 will continue to operate its FM
repeater in a basic, 'zombie sat' mode, so that the repeater
remains on-the-air.
o Fox-1 is designed as the immediate replacement for AO-51. Its U/V
(Mode B) transponder will make it even easier to work with modest
equipment.
o From the ground user's perspective, the same FM amateur radio
equipment used for AO-51 may be used for Fox-1.
AMSAT's Fox-1 project timeline is based on
targeting a launch in the second half
of 2013. NASA will determine on which flight each of the Project ELaNa CubeSats
fly. They have updated their CubeSat Launch Initiative web page including
AMSAT's participation at:
http://www.nasa.gov/directorates/heo/home/CubeSats_initiative.html
[ANS thanks the Fox-1 Team for the above information]
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AMSAT-NA Board of Directors Nominations
It is time to submit nominations for the upcoming open seats on the
AMSAT-NA Board of Directors. A valid nomination requires either one
current Member Society, or five current individual members in good
standing, to nominate an AMSAT-NA member for the position.
Three directors and two alternate directors have terms expiring this
year. The director seats open for election are held by Tom Clark,
K3IO; Lou McFadin, W5DID; and Gould Smith, WA4SXM. The alternate dir-
ector seats open for election are held by Mark Hammond, N8MH and
Patrick Stoddard, WD9EWK.
The three nominees receiving the highest number of votes will be
seated as regular board members with two year terms. The two nom-
inees receiving the next highest number of votes will be seated as
alternate directors for one year.
Written nominations, consisting of names, calls and individual signa-
tures, should be mailed to: AMSAT-NA, 850 Sligo Ave #600, Silver
Spring, MD, 20910. They must be received no later than June 15th. No
other action is required.
Nominations may also be made by electronic means including e-mail,
FAX, or electronic image of a petition. Electronic petitions should
be sent to MARTHA@AMSAT.ORG or faxed to 301-608-3410, and also must
be received by June 15th. If using any electronic submission, there
is a second, verifying step:
ELECTRONIC SUBMISSIONS WITHOUT THIS SECOND, WRITTEN VERIFICATION
ARE NOT VALID UNDER THE EXISTING AMSAT-NA BYLAWS. A verifying
traditional written petition MUST be received at the AMSAT-NA
office at the above address within 7 days following the close
of nominations.
[ANS Thanks AMSAT Secretary Alan Biddle, WA4SCA for the above
information]
---------------------------------------------------------------------
EPFL Announces Nanosat Ion Drive - To The Moon on 100 mL of Fuel
An article posted on space-travel.com reported the EPFL University
in Switzerland announced the first prototype of a new, ultra-compact
motor that will allow small satellites to journey beyond Earth's
orbit. (See: http://tinyurl.com/EPFL-IonMotor)
EPFL said the MicroThrust ion motor will be capable of reaching the
Moon using just a tenth of a liter of fuel. The complete thruster
weighs just a few hundred grams and is specifically designed to pro-
pel small (1-100 kg) satellites, which it enables to change orbit
around the Earth and even voyage to more distant destinations -
functions typically possible only for large, expensive spacecraft.
Instead of a combustible fuel, the new mini motor runs on an "ionic"
liquid, in this case the chemical compound EMI-BF4, which is used
as a solvent and an electrolyte. It is composed of electrically
charged molecules (like ordinary table salt) called ions, except that
this compound is liquid at room temperature. The ions are extracted
from the liquid and then ejected by means of an electric field to
generate thrust. This is the principle behind the ionic motor: fuel
is not burned, it is expelled.
After six months of acceleration, the microsatellite's speed increases
from 24,000 km/h, its launch speed, to 42,000 km/h. The acceleration
is only about a tenth of a millimeter per square second, which trans-
lates into 0-100 km/h in 77 hours. But in space, where there is no
friction to impede motion, gentle but steady acceleration is the way
to go.
"We calculated that in order to reach lunar orbit, a 1-kg nanosatel-
lite with our motor would travel for about six months and consume 100
milliliters of fuel," explains Muriel Richard, a scientist in EPFL's
Swiss Space Center.
A video about the MicroThrust has been posted at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=YJlSI_l5g4M
[ANS thanks Space-Travel.com for the above information]
---------------------------------------------------------------------
European ATV-3 Edoardo Amaldi Arrives at ISS & Performs Reboost
After a successful launch on March 23, the heaviest cargo ship ever
has arrived and docked to the International Space Station. The 20-ton
European ATV-3 cargo ship, named "Edoardo Amaldi" after the Italian
physicist and spaceflight pioneer, made a "smooth and gentle" docking
on March 28. It delivered 7 tons of food, drinking water, clothing,
oxygen, spare parts and fuel for the 6-member ISS crew.
A video of the docking with ISS can be viewed at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=PorM-1F4jdo
On Saturday, March 31 the ATV reboosted the space station's orbit to
389.8 km. The ATV's thrusters ran for 351 seconds, increasing ISS vel-
ocity by 1.0 m/s and boosting average altitude by 1.73 km. This is a
standard test performed as soon as possible after docking.
The successful test burn means that ATV is ready for a series of
larger planned reboosts (the first expected on 5 April) and to con-
duct debris avoidance manoeuvres when necessary.
Read more on-line at:
http://tinyurl.com/ISS-ATVBoost1 (space-travel.com)
http://tinyurl.com/ISS-ATVBoost2 (space-travel.com)
An article posted on spaceflightnow.com on April 2 reports that the
huge cargo freighters, weighing more than 20 tons fully loaded, will
stop flying in 2014 when the fifth resupply craft delivers equipment
to the International Space Station. ESA member states decided to dis-
continue the program after briefly considering redesigning the throw
away cargo craft to return hardware in a hardened re-entry capsule.
Read the full article on-line at:
http://spaceflightnow.com/news/n1204/02atvfuture/
The ESA published a new video on their youtube channel showing ESA
astronaut André Kuipers and cosmonaut Oleg Kononenko opening the hatch
to the ATV and begin unloading the cargo. See:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=AORrisDldqM
[ANS thanks Space-Travel.com and SpaceFlightNow.com for the above
information]
---------------------------------------------------------------------
California Students Contact ISS Astronaut
The amateur radio club at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis
Obispo, California arranged for an Amateur Radio on the International Space
Station (ARISS) contact for elementary school students, 4H-club members and
Scouts on Tuesday, March 27. The connection was
made by telebridge station AH6NM
in Hawaii. Approximately 150 students were in attendance. Local news station
KSBY and the Cal Poly newspaper Mustang Daily covered the event; NASA-TV
replayed the contact audio on March 28. The ARISS
event complemented the science
fair held to get students interested in Science, Technology, Engineering and
Mathematics (STEM). To view the article, see:
http://mustangdaily.net/radio-club-makes-contact-with-international-space-
station/
and the news clip:
http://www.ksby.com/videos/cal-poly-connects-with-outer-space/
[ANS thanks Carol, KB3LKI, for the above information]
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Satellite Shorts From All Over
+ Education and Technology Program Director Mark Spencer, WA8SME
will try to activate W1AW on AO-27 on April 10 for the 1830Z
pass. Fastest QSL is via his callbook address.
+ The 50 MHz and Up Group has issued the first call for papers for
the 2012 Microwave Update Conference to be held October 18-21 in
Santa Clara, California. For more information on submitting papers
as well as all other aspects of the conference please go to:
http://www.microwaveupdate.org
+ The International Space Station Benefits for Humanity brochure
is a collection of in-depth descriptions about benefits from
research on the space station. The benefits outlined serve as
examples of the space station's potential as a ground breaking
scientific research facility. This collection was developed
collaboratively by the members of the Canadian Space Agency,
European Space Agency, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency,
NASA and the Russian Federal Space Agency. To view the brochure,
visit http://tinyurl.com/NASA-Brochure (nasa.gov)
+ A NASA Educator's Guide about Rockets is available on-line at:
http://tinyurl.com/NASAForEducators (nasa.gov)
+ Bob, WB4APR noted a need for an Australian Amateur Astronomer and
HAM operator in Canberra on 4-6 June 2012. Assistance is needed to
support a science team of students from the USA to observe the last
transit of Venus this century in Canberra. We want a local Austra-
lian Ham to be there to see if we can use ham radio and the speed
of light to share observations with our sister team in Japan (and
any other observation sites). Interested individuals for this his-
toric event, contact WB4APR@amsat.org
+ Tom Medlin, W5KUB, known for his live webcasts from the Dayton
Hamvention and Huntsville Hamfest will also broadcast from the
Memphis FreeFest on Saturday, April 14 between 0900-1500 CDT
(UTC-5). Tom says, "This is a small hamfest but we will have a
few prize drawings during the broadcast. All you need to enter
the drawing is to be in our chatroom when the drawings are ann-
ounced." The internet video feed and the chatroom can be found
at: http://w5kub.com. This page streams previously recorded video
from Dayton when live broadcasts are not airing.
+ The next Hudson Valley Satcom net date is Thursday, April 12 at
8:00 PM EDT (UTC -4) on the 146.970 MHz repeater, and also on
the N2EYH-L Echolink node. More info: http://www.hvsatcom.org/
(via Stu, WA2BSS)
[ANS thanks everyone for the above information]
/EX
In addition to regular membership, AMSAT offers membership in the
President's Club. Members of the President's Club, as sustaining
donors to AMSAT Project Funds, will be eligible to receive addi-
tional benefits. Application forms are available from the AMSAT
Office.
Primary and secondary school students are eligible for membership
at one-half the standard yearly rate. Post-secondary school students
enrolled in at least half time status shall be eligible for the stu-
dent rate for a maximum of 6 post-secondary years in this status.
Contact Martha at the AMSAT Office for additional student membership
information.
73,
This week's ANS Editor,
Lee McLamb, KU4OS
ku4os at amsat dot org
_______________________________________________
Via the ANS mailing list courtesy of AMSAT-NA
http://amsat.org/mailman/listinfo/ans