Micro satellites

Just spending a few hundred to 1,000 USD is able to own an artificial satellite. It is not a tough joke but a cherished project by Zac Manchester scientist, of course with a low price, the telecommunications satellite - called Sprites - will be very small with an area equal to 2 stamp.

>>> Watch video: Introducing the micro-satellite Sprites

Telecommunication satellites Sprites

Sprites like a cosmic dust, using solar power to roam in space to collect data. Air engineer Zac Manchester and his colleagues at Cornell University (USA) gave these three tiny spacecraft to the ISS International Space Station. They are mounted outside the ISS to consider not only information transmission, but also durability in harsh environments.

Each tiny artificial satellite is fitted with microcontroller, tiny radio transceiver station, solar absorbers, capacitance and transceiver antenna ( above ). The current prototype of Sprites can only transmit simple data bits. However, Zac Manchester believes that in the near future this type of personal telecommunications satellite will have more modern versions with sensors that act as thermometers and cameras.

A small CubeSat box containing Sprites inside.

A small box called CubeSat contains Sprites inside. When entering the low-range orbit of the Earth, CubeSat door will open, the spring system will launch Sprites into space through the radio control signal from the ground. Once in orbit, the signal emitted by Sprites will be monitored by a series of amateur space stations on earth to demonstrate their effective communication capabilities. After a few days or weeks of space activity, when the Sprites returned, the atmosphere would be burned because of their small size.

Zac Manchester and his colleagues are trying to raise funds for the project to come into reality through Kickstater website, they hope Sprites will officially orbit in 2013. Currently, if spending 300 USD, customers will be entitled to transmits a spatial message to Sprites, can even name one of the later Sprites with no more than 4 characters. If you donate $ 1,000 or more, you are provided with the source code and programming tool to set up routes for Sprites; besides, how to set up ground station, how to receive and decode their signals.