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Resurrecting NEOSSat: How Innovative Flight Software Saved Canada’s Space Telescope

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Abstract

After on-orbit failure of its magnetometer and all torque rods, the NEOSSat microsatellite has recovered operations through the use of novel attitude determination and control algorithms. Attitude determination without the magnetometer was restored through the creation of a new attitude sensor from onboard GPS sensors. Desaturation without the torque rods was achieved through an innovative new control mode to orient the satellite’s internal residual dipole for optimal momentum dumping. Now operational based on a minimal sensor and actuator suite, NEOSSat has regained the performance necessary to accomplish its space surveillance missions with only a modest duty cycle reduction and adjustments to spacecraft operation planning. This paper, summarizing the NEOSSat mission and the unique flight software upgrades that enabled its recovery, expands the body of knowledge in GPS-based attitude determination and momentum management strategies for satellites.

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Abbreviations

α, α :

Elevation angle, column matrix of elevation angles

ACS:

Attitude Control System

Am2:

Ampere meters-squares

b :

GPS antenna boresight vector (inertial frame)

\( \vec{\varvec{B}} \) :

Earth’s magnetic field vector (inertial frame)

CCD:

Charge-coupled device

CSA:

Canadian Space Agency

C/N0:

Carrier-to-noise density ratio

DRDC:

Defence Research and Development Canada

GPS:

Global Positioning System

\( \Delta \vec{H} \) :

Change in total spacecraft stored momentum (inertial frame)

\( \vec{H}_{\text{excess}} \) :

Excess total spacecraft stored momentum (inertial frame)

HEOSS:

High-Earth Orbit Space Surveillance

J :

Cost function value

\( \vec{m}_{\text{tgt}} \) :

Inertial frame target spacecraft residual dipole vector

MOST:

Microvariability and Oscillations of Stars

MPC:

Minor Planet Center

MSCI:

Microsat Systems Canada Inc

NEOSSat:

Near-Earth Object Surveillance Satellite

Nm2:

Newton meters-squares

RMS:

Root-Mean-Square

σ :

Weight variable

s :

Sightline vector to GPS space vehicle (inertial frame)

SV:

GPS space vehicle

\( \vec{\tau } \) :

External torques applied to the spacecraft (inertial frame)

TESS:

Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite

References

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Acknowledgements

The team would like to acknowledge and thank its partners in satellite operations from SED Systems, a division of Calian Ltd., who supported the recovery effort and helped to ensure that NEOSSat survived during the outage period created by two major hardware failures. Several software and system engineers at CSA and DRDC supported the operations team in various phases of the recovery effort and deserve acknowledgment and appreciation. In particular, DRDC scientists Robert (Lauchie) Scott and Stefan Thorsteinson played key roles within the NEOSSat recovery team and the authors are indebted to them for their expertise and ongoing support. We would also like to thank Dr. Jason Rowe, from Bishop’s University, for his enthusiastic exploration of exoplanet photometry applications with NEOSSat and David Balam, from the Dominion Astrophysical Observatory in British Columbia, for his contributions in astrometric processing of NEOSSat images of near-Earth asteroids and comets. Finally, we recognize project sponsors at CSA and DRDC whose support was an essential enabler for recovery of the NEOSSat mission. We look forward to ongoing collaboration with all of our partners to advance space situational awareness, near-Earth object tracking and exoplanet research with this unique space telescope.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Canadian Space Agency, 6767 route de l’aéroport, Saint-Hubert, QC, J3Y 8Y9, Canada

    Viqar Abbasi, Natasha Jackson & Michel Doyon

  2. Microsat Systems Canada Inc, 6877 Goreway Drive Unit 2, Mississauga, ON, L4V 1L9, Canada

    Ron Wessels, Pooya Sekhavat, Matthew Cannata & Ross Gillett

  3. Magellan Aerospace, 3701 Carling Avenue, Ottawa, ON, K2H 8S2, Canada

    Stuart Eagleson

Authors
  1. Viqar Abbasi
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  2. Natasha Jackson
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  3. Michel Doyon
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  4. Ron Wessels
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  5. Pooya Sekhavat
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  6. Matthew Cannata
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  7. Ross Gillett
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  8. Stuart Eagleson
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Viqar Abbasi .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Direction du Numérique, de l'exploitation et des Opérations, Centre National D’Etudes Spatiales—CNES, Toulouse, France

    Helene Pasquier

  2. Payload and Mission Operations, NASA Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, AL, USA

    Craig A. Cruzen

  3. German Space Operations Center, DLR—German Aerospace Center, Wessling, Bayern, Germany

    Michael Schmidhuber

  4. NASA/Jet Propulsion Laboratory/California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA

    Young H. Lee

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Abbasi, V. et al. (2019). Resurrecting NEOSSat: How Innovative Flight Software Saved Canada’s Space Telescope. In: Pasquier, H., Cruzen, C., Schmidhuber, M., Lee, Y. (eds) Space Operations: Inspiring Humankind's Future. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-11536-4_23

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-11536-4_23

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-11535-7

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-11536-4

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