UoSAT-12

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to: navigation, search
UoSAT-12
Operator University of Surrey
Major contractors SSTL
Launch date 1999 April 21 05:00 UTC
Carrier rocket Dnepr 1
Launch site Baikonur
COSPAR ID 1999-021A
SATCAT 25693
Orbital elements
Inclination 7.1 deg
Apoapsis 35,831 km
Periapsis 661 km
Orbital period 659 min
References: [1]

UoSAT-12 is a British satellite in Low Earth Orbit. It is the twelfth satellite in the University of Surrey series and was designed and built by Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd (SSTL). It was launched into orbit in April 1999 on board a Dnepr-1 rocket from Baikonur. [2]

[edit] Mission

UoSAT-12 was an experimental mission used to demonstrate and test a number of new technologies. Imaging cameras and a high-speed 1 Mbit/s S-band downlink (the MERLION experiment) were tested. An Internet Protocol stack was uploaded to the satellite, allowing experiments in extending the Internet to space to be made by NASA Goddard as part of its Operating Missions as Nodes on the Internet (OMNI) effort.[3][4]

These now-proven technologies were later adopted by SSTL in the design of its Disaster Monitoring Constellation satellites.

[edit] See also

[edit] References

  1. ^ "Sat Cat". Celestrak. Retrieved 26 June 2012. 
  2. ^ M. Fouquet and M. Sweeting, UoSAT-12 minisatellite for high performance Earth observation at low cost, proceedings of IAF '96.
  3. ^ K. Hogie, et al., Using standard Internet Protocols and applications in space, Computer Networks, special issue on Interplanetary Internet, vol. 47 no. 5, pp. 603-650, April 2005.
  4. ^ K. Hogie, et al., Putting more Internet nodes in space, CSC World, Computer Sciences Corporation, pp. 21-23, April/June 2006.