A Channel 4 news report on Sunday 9th October 2011 covered SSTL’s work towards the creation of an Interplanetary Internet (IPN) system that could change the way space exploration is conducted.

The development of the Internet originally aimed to connect the world, now one of its founders, Vint Cerf (Google Chief Internet Evangelist) is pioneering something much bigger: a network whose reach could extend further than our solar system and potentially allow transfer of data to and from spacecraft travelling to stars 30 trillion miles, or 4 light years, away.

Our terrestrial Internet requires few resends between nodes and data can be quickly resent end-to-end. This works well on Earth where everyone is significantly less than a light second apart and where a constant connection can be provided. However, the bigger the distances involved in space travel, the longer the data takes and the harder it is to guarantee a connection as it can be blocked by the sun and planets. This means that there can be delays of hours, or even days in the transfer of data.

The use of delay tolerant networking rectifies this. Under this system, each node stores data until it can be forwarded to the next node allowing greater use of available contact periods, greater accuracy in the transfer of data, and shorter overall delays in data delivery.

In SSTL’s current work, delay tolerant networking could be used to ensure maximum contact between Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellites and Earth. In constellations of satellites, each individual acts as a node, and can communicate with each other using Inter-Satellite Links (ISLs) to send data via the quickest route. Data might be sent to a geostationary satellite that has contact with a ground station, providing more opportunities to get data downlinked. This system is faster and much more cost effective if cost is considered as data per pound or euro - it’s more science for your money. Also, the network can be fully automated, reducing operation costs.

Using delay tolerant networking to send and receive data reliably, and as soon as possible, could be particularly useful for defence and disaster monitoring, by reducing the delay between the satellite acquiring data and then waiting for its orbit to bring it within contact with its groundstation so that the data can be downlinked.

In 2003, CLEO, a Cisco router on a LEO satellite was launched onboard SSTL’s UK–DMC-1 satellite and is still in use after eight years in orbit. Working together and using Internet technology to prototype the future Interplanetary Internet, NASA Glenn Research Center, SSTL and Cisco Systems were the first to evaluate the delay-tolerant networking bundle protocol in space. CLEO was a prototype for the concept of IPN, and was followed by the launch of Intelsat’s IRIS geostationary satellite in 2009.

Despite discussions as early as 1998, IPN is only now becoming a reality. A prototype node is already on the International Space Station and an interplanetary Internet system could potentially be in operation for interplanetary exploration by 2018/2020.

Cloud cover is one of the main challenges of satellite imaging, because there’s always a risk that the view of an area is disrupted. This is especially true when an area needs to be imaged at regular intervals to detect changes, or when it needs to be imaged rapidly, for example in the event of a disaster. With this in mind, engineers at SSTL have developed a new innovative Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) system called NovaSAR-S which was unveiled this week at the International Astronautical Congress (IAC) in Cape Town.

Rather than follow a traditional development process, the SSTL approach was to design a baseline mission which addressed the question “what imaging performance can we achieve with a spacecraft that can be built and operated at low cost, and is compatible with low cost launches?”

NovaSAR-S complements much larger, complex and power-hungry radar satellites with a small and lower priced mission that delivers imagery in all weather during both day and night. One of the biggest technical challenges was managing energy use onboard, which was solved in part by using new highly efficient S-band solid-state amplifier technology. By combining a modified SSTL-300 platform (used by NigeriaSat-2 satellite) with an innovative S-band SAR payload, that was developed in partnership with Astrium, NovaSAR-S offers radar capability for the cost of an earth observation satellite – a capability otherwise not considered economically possible.

So what’s SAR good at?

Imaging through clouds means that NovaSAR is ideal for providing rapid-response imagery for disaster relief operations and aiding disaster assessment, for example in the event of a flooding.

Its cloud-piercing imaging also offers new possibilities for crop monitoring, mapping agricultural land and assessing crop condition, as these applications demand imaging on a strictly regular basis – come rain or shine.

Many of the world's forests are found in tropical areas where cloud cover is dominant, which means that NovaSAR also is well suited for detailed forestry assessments.

This baseline SAR is also ideally suited to maritime and coastal applications such as ship and oil spill monitoring, or detecting shifts in ice formations and other environmental phenomena.

Of course, it doesn’t stop there – and we’re looking forward to exploring the possibilities of this new technology. In this recent article on BBC News online, SSTL’s head of Earth observation, Luis Gomes said: "It's nice to have the technology but we want people to engage in terms of services - to come up with uses for this sort of data for the scientific community and commercial world. These discussions are on-going."

Are you sitting on an Android App that would work in space? Working in their lunch breaks and spare time, a team of SSTL engineers and researchers from the University of Surrey has built STRaND-1, the first satellite being powered by a smartphone. Mobile phones are getting more and more advanced and are today incredibly powerful. With components such as sensors, video cameras, GPS systems and Wi-Fi radios, smartphones have many similarities to Earth observation satellites and potentially a lot to offer as a payload.




The STRaND-1 team is now offering the opportunity for the UK public to take part in the mission through a contest, which will allow the winner to develop an Android App to be used on the mobile phone in space. The contest is now open on Facebook and the STRaND-1 team will choose the four most innovative, inspirational and fun App ideas. The winner will also be able to see their App run in space from the mission control centre at SSTL’s headquarters in Guildford.

Project Manager at SSTL, Shaun Kenyon said: "The STRaND project could lead the way to a new era of hardware and software testing for Surrey. We're almost ready to integrate all of the subsystems - a very exciting time to be involved in such influential work. Tell us what you'd like to do via our Facebook page, and what you need to achieve it, so that we can ensure the best apps are supported on STRaND"

STRaND-1 (Surrey Training, Research and Nanosatellite Development) is built as a ‘CubeSat’ measuring 34cm x 10cm x 10cm, and weighs about 4kg. The Space App contestants will be able to make use of new technologies such as a new type of radio receiver, as well as GPS positioning, a 5MP camera, 3-axis accelerometers, 1GHz processor and a microphone. App ideas and entrants are lining up, giving the team a challenging time ahead in choosing the winners.

To find out more and to enter the competition, visit www.facebook.com/nanosats

For the latest updates and discussions around the competition, follow @SurreyNanosats on Twitter.

For some years now, SSTL has been using its Disaster Monitoring Constellation satellites to assist people around the globe who have become victims of natural disasters. On behalf of the International Charter, imagery has been rapidly collected, analysed, and then delivered to relief organisations which use the data in the immediate aftermath of natural catastrophes such as tsunamis, forest fires, floods, and earthquakes.

It has long been an ambition to move beyond “Disaster Monitoring” into the realm of “Disaster Mitigation”: providing assistance not only after the event has happened, but reducing the impact of the event by providing warning in advance of an impending disaster.

In some cases, of course, this is already possible. Hurricanes and cyclones can be tracked across the oceans for several days in advance of their landfall, giving residents in their path time to prepare. And indeed, this warning period also provides relief organisations with the opportunity to schedule imagery collection opportunities in anticipation of the expected destruction.

But other catastrophes are much harder to forecast, and perhaps the most intractable are earthquakes. Infrequently, major earthquakes, (so-called intra-plate earthquakes), occur unexpectedly, well away from known fault lines: an example being the magnitude 8 New Madrid earthquake of 1812, which was powerful enough to change the course of the Mississippi river in the USA.

Most of the time, however, earthquakes occur in relatively predictable locations on known fault lines – the San Andreas fault in California being probably the best known crack in the Earth’s crust.

So the problem is not so much to determine where an earthquake is likely to occur, but rather trying to figure out when it will happen. Consequently, scientists have spent years looking for precursor signals that they can measure in advance of an earthquake to provide people with an adequate warning.

Continue reading "Earthquake Prediction From Space "