Mon, Jan 23, 2012
SPHERES Challenge Will Have Students Controlling A Satellite
Aboard ISS
NASA will join the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency
(DARPA), the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and high
school student teams from the U.S. and abroad for the third annual
Zero Robotics SPHERES Challenge on Monday, January 23. The event
will take place on the MIT campus in Cambridge, MA.
For the competition, NASA will upload software developed by high
school students onto Synchronized Position Hold, Engage, Reorient,
Experimental Satellites (SPHERES), which are bowling ball-sized
spherical satellites aboard the International Space Station. The
top 27 teams from previous competitions will have their code sent
Monday to the space station, where an astronaut will command the
satellites to execute the teams' flight program. During a simulated
mission, the teams will complete a special challenge inspired by
future satellite technologies, such as formation flight and close
proximity operations.
Student finalists will be able to see their flight program live
in the televised finals. The team with the highest software
performance over several rounds of the competition will win the
challenge. The winning team will be awarded certificates and a
SPHERES flight patch that was flown to the space station.
In addition to their use in this competition, the satellites are
used inside the space station to conduct formation flight maneuvers
for spacecraft guidance navigation, control and docking. The three
separate satellites that make up SPHERES fly in formation inside
the space station's cabin. The satellites provide opportunities to
test a wide range of hardware and software at an affordable
cost.
The SPHERES National Laboratory Facility on the station is
operated and maintained by NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett
Field, CA.
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