NAIL: Developing ST5 involved a new approach to satellite design that required creating miniaturized technology.
This next feature tells us how.
NARRATOR: ST5 is about illustrating new technologies for satellites on orbit and making small satellites so
future programs can benefit from it. ST5, we have done one unique thing -- several unique things
and that's to miniaturize something like a magnetometer that usually is a very large component on spacecraft
to make it something that fits in the palm of your hand. And also, technologies like electronics that usually are higher
voltage, but we have, we are going to demonstrate on ST5 that very low-voltage and low-power technologies
can be used in space. Basically since we're launching three of them, it's going to prove how you manage three satellites
at the same time on orbit. The smallest satellite that we normally build is the size of a barrel or garbage can that you have outside
your house. But ST5 is building a satellite which is 25 kilograms and the size of a large birthday cake.
The low-power electronics that we're using and validating on the, on the ST5 mission is going to make the future
satellites much smaller, because it's going to be consuming less power. And also, this technology will find its way
into the commercial market, which will make the cell phones much smaller,
all the electronic components will be much smaller and will consume less power.
NARRATOR: The most interesting thing about ST5 is that it's small and it's capable, and that you can really do interesting
science with it. We've miniaturized a number of components. First of all, we have a micro-thruster that's what
moves our spacecraft around. It's about the size of a quarter. We have a lithium-iron battery, one of the first lithium-iron
batteries to be flown in space. It fits on my outstretched hand. We have a magnetometer that's a very capable science
instrument. It fits inside my fist. We have a transponder that's what we used to communicate between the spacecraft and the ground
that would fit into this hand right here. After the third stage burns out and the rocket stops firing,
the first spacecraft is launched about three minutes later. And then the second spacecraft again,
Frisbee that about three minutes after that, and then the third spacecraft about three minutes after that.
Our spacecraft, when they're first Frisbeed off of the launch vehicle, go into an orbit that's elliptical around the Earth.
At its closest point, it's about 300 kilometers. At its farthest away point, it's about 4,500 kilometers,
and they're in what's called a "string of pearls." So they're just kind of spread out over that elliptical
orbit around the Earth. They start out literally just meters apart, and then over the course of the mission, we use the initial drift
of the satellites, as well as the micro-thruster that we have, to maneuver them into different positions
that are really tens to low-100's of kilometers apart.
We're also developing some ground-system technologies. What we've done is to highly automate our control center,
and we'll be using that over the course of the mission and we're going to do a one-week, "lights-out" demonstration.
And what that means is that there will be no actual people manning the consoles, that the automation will be taking care
of the spacecraft. And the reason that's useful is because in the future, we'll be having lots and lots of
spacecraft and we can't have lots and lots of people operating them. We'll have to have the computers all taking care of it themselves.