First Satellite Developed By High Schoolers Sent Into Space
Source: WPR
The first satellite ever developed by high school students to make it to space is believed to be orbiting Earth after getting a ride aboard a U.S. military rocket Tuesday night from Wallops Island, Va.
Fittingly, perhaps, you can send it a text message.
The satellite, using a voice synthesizer, is built to transform that text into an audio message that can be heard over certain radio frequencies around the globe, and in different languages.
The 2-pound TJ3Sat was built by about 50 students over the past seven years at the public Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology in Alexandria, Va., working with volunteers from its corporate sponsor, Orbital Sciences.
Read more: http://news.wpr.org/post/first-satellite-developed-high-schoolers-sent-space
PhoneSat 2.4: Ready for Launch
For the second time this year, NASA is preparing to send a smartphone-controlled small spacecraft into orbit. The PhoneSat 2.4 mission is demonstrating innovative new approaches for small spacecraft technologies of the future.
The NASA PhoneSat 2.4 is hitch-hiking a ride onboard an Orbital Minotaur I rocket slated for a November 19 liftoff from the Mid Atlantic Regional Spaceport at NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia. The primary payload on the booster is the U.S. Air Force Office of Responsive Space ORS-3 mission, which will validate launch and range improvements for NASA and the military.
PhoneSat 2.4 builds upon the successful flights of a trio of NASA smartphone satellites that were orbited together last April. That pioneering mission gauged use of consumer-grade smartphone technology as the main control electronics of a capable, yet very low-cost, satellite, reports Andrew Petro, program executive for small spacecraft technology at NASA Headquarters in Washington.
Each smartphone is housed in a standard cubesat structure, measuring roughly four inches square.
http://www.nasa.gov/content/phonesat-24-ready-for-launch/