NEOSSat – World’s First Dedicated Near Earth Object Surveillance Satellite
- Paper number
IAC-09.B4.2.2
- Author
Dr. Mak Tafazoli, Canadian Space Agency, Canada
- Coauthor
Dr. Denis Laurin, Canada
- Coauthor
Mr. William Harvey, Canadian Space Agency, Canada
- Coauthor
Dr. Alan R. Hildebrand, University of Calgary, Canada
- Coauthor
Mr. Brad Wallace, Defence R&D Canada (DRDC), Canada
- Year
2009
- Abstract
The Canadian Space Agency (CSA) launched the highly successful Microvariability and Oscillation of Stars (MOST) astronomy microsatellite spacecraft on June 30th, 2003 which is still in operation after 5½ years. Building upon the demonstrated effectiveness and success of MOST, Defence Research and Development Canada (DRDC) and the CSA are jointly funding the Near-Earth Object Surveillance Satellite (NEOSSat) Project. The NEOSSat microsatellite project is designed to satisfy three mission objectives: 1) discover and determine the orbits of Near-Earth Objects (NEO's) that cannot be efficiently detected from the ground, 2) demonstrate the ability of a microsatellite to produce useful metric (position/time) data on man-made, Earth-orbiting objects with altitudes between 15,000 and 40,000 km, and 3) carry out a flight demonstration of the CSA’s first multi-mission microsatellite bus (MMMB). Starting in 2006, the NEOSSat project has passed through a competitive bidding process that resulted in the NEOSSat Phase B/C/D development contract award in July 2007 to an industrial team led by Dynacon\MSCI. The project Critical Design Review (CDR) will be held in March 2009. While NEOSSat takes advantage of MOST heritage, the spacecraft design has evolved to achieve significant performance gains and the multi-mission approach establishes capabilities applicable for future microsatellite missions. NEOSSat, being equipped with a 15 cm Maksutov optical telescope, will offer marked advantages in searching for Near-Earth Asteroids (NEA) and comets from space compared to ground-based telescopes. The ability to a) search the ecliptic plane at elongations close to the Sun ($>$45 deg), b) to use parallax to discriminate NEAs from those of the Main Belt through distance determinations, and c) to observe continuously, are the most significant advantages of a space platform. The NEOSSat spacecraft is expected to be able to detect objects with a V magnitude of 20 with a 100 sec exposure, over a 0.86 deg field of view on a 1024x1024 CCD, with 0.5 arcsecond pointing stability. For discovery of NEAs, it will search an area from 45 to 55 degrees solar elongation along the ecliptic plane and ± 40 degrees in ecliptic latitude (the observation strategy will be optimized, based upon recent models of the NEA population). Ground-based telescopes will be used to do follow-ups for orbit determination when possible. As an equal partner on NEOSSat, DRDC will use the spacecraft to demonstrate the capability of an inexpensive space platform to detect and track satellites and debris in high-Earth orbits. NEOSSat is targeted for launch in 2010 for at least a 1-year mission after commissioning and a goal of 2 years. This paper describes the overall progress of the NEOSSat mission focussing primarily on the engineering development of the spacecraft and ground segment, and will also include highlights of the science objectives.
- Abstract document
- Manuscript document
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