Interview: How CubeSats revolutionize scientific space research

Weekend Special | July 13, 2019

The era of CubeSats is definitely in full swing. CubeSats ‒ tiny, versatile spacecraft ‒ are small satellites commonly used in low Earth orbit (LEO) for various applications, such as remote sensing and communications.

These miniature spacecraft are built to standard dimensions of the 10 cm cubic units with specified electrical power and mass capabilities. Currently, lighter, cheaper and less power-consuming than traditional satellites, CubeSats are mainly orbiting in low Earth orbit about 70 to 2,000 km (approximately 45 to 1,200 miles) above the Earth.

CubeSats are used for space education and scientific research. In the future, CubeSats, already being used in interplanetary missions, will go farther into space than any CubeSats have gone before.

Merve Kara from AeroTime has spoken with Yigit Cay, an engineer and a Ph.D. student at Kyushu Institute of Technology (Japan), working on BIRDS-4 Satellite Project, about how CubeSats are revolutionizing space exploration.

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