Small Satellites: The future of Earth observation and space exploration missions

摘要

Earth orbiting satellites come in a wide range of shapes and sizes in order to meet a diverse variety of uses and applications. While the larger of these satellites with masses exceeding 1000kg support high resolution remote sensing of the Earth, high bandwidth communications services and world-class scientific studies, they take a long time in development and are overly expensive to build and deploy. Consequently, interest in the smaller-sized satellites has skyrocketed in recent years. Their reduced development time and launch costs, compared to conventional large satellites, have made them an excellent replacement in many areas. This article dives into this technology and how it represents a bright future for space exploration and Earth observation missions.