RAIKO (, literally ''thunder drum'') is a Japanese

satellite A satellite or an artificial satellite is an object, typically a spacecraft, placed into orbit around a celestial body. They have a variety of uses, including communication relay, weather forecasting, navigation ( GPS), broadcasting, scient ...

which was built and operated by Tohoku and

Wakayama Wakayama may refer to: * Wakayama Prefecture, a prefecture of Japan * Wakayama (city), the capital city of Wakayama Prefecture, Japan * Wakayama Station, a train station in Wakayama, Wakayama * Wakayama University, a national university in Wakayama, ...

Universities. A two-unit

CubeSat A CubeSat is a class of small satellite with a form factor of cubes. CubeSats have a mass of no more than per unit,, url=https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5418c831e4b0fa4ecac1bacd/t/5f24997b6deea10cc52bb016/1596234122437/CDS+REV14+2020-07-3 ...

, RAIKO was deployed from the

International Space Station The International Space Station (ISS) is a large space station that was Assembly of the International Space Station, assembled and is maintained in low Earth orbit by a collaboration of five space agencies and their contractors: NASA (United ...

(ISS) on 4 October 2012, having been launched on 21 July 2012. RAIKO was launched aboard the Kounotori 3 (HTV-3) spacecraft, atop an

H-IIB H-IIB (H2B) was an expendable space launch system jointly developed by the Japanese government's space agency JAXA and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries. It was used to launch the H-II Transfer Vehicle (HTV, or ''Kōnotori'') cargo spacecraft for ...

launch vehicle flying from pad LC-Y2 of the

Yoshinobu Launch Complex Yoshinobu Launch Complex (abbreviated as LA-Y) is a List of rocket launch sites, rocket launch site at the Tanegashima Space Center on Tanegashima. The site and its collection of facilities were originally built for the H-II launch vehicle and ...

at the

Tanegashima Space Center The (TNSC) is Japan's primary spaceport, covering approximately about . It is located on the southeastern tip of Tanegashima, the easternmost of the Ōsumi Islands, approximately south of the major island of Kyushu. The site was selected on ...

. The launch occurred at 02:06:18

UTC Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) is the primary time standard globally used to regulate clocks and time. It establishes a reference for the current time, forming the basis for civil time and time zones. UTC facilitates international communica ...

on 21 July 2012. Four other CubeSats were launched with RAIKO;

WE WISH WE WISH (World Environmental Watching and Investigation from Space Height) was a small commercial CubeSat which was deployed from the International Space Station (ISS) in October 2012 and which deorbited in March 2013. It was built by the Japan ...

, FITSAT-1, TechEdSat-1 and F-1. The five CubeSats was delivered to the International Space Station for deployment. CubeSats were deployed from Japanese Experiment Module (JEM) '' Kibō'' via the J-SSOD system on 4 October 2012. Named after a Japanese god of thunder, RAIKO is a spacecraft, which was used for technology demonstration. It carries a camera with a

fish-eye lens A fisheye lens is an ultra wide angle lens, ultra wide-angle lens that produces strong Distortion (optics), visual distortion intended to create a wide panorama, panoramic or Sphere#Hemisphere, hemispherical image. Fisheye lenses achieve extremel ...

for

Earth imaging Satellite images (also Earth observation imagery, spaceborne photography, or simply satellite photo) are images of Earth collected by imaging satellites operated by governments and businesses around the world. Satellite imaging companies sell i ...

, a prototype

star tracker A star tracker is an optical device that measures the positions of stars using photocells or a camera. As the positions of many stars have been measured by astronomers to a high degree of accuracy, a star tracker on a satellite or spacecraft may ...

, a deployable membrane to slow the satellite, lowering its orbit, a photographic system to measure the satellite's movement relative to the International Space Station, and a

Ku-band The Ku band () is the portion of the electromagnetic spectrum in the microwave range of frequencies from 12 to 18 gigahertz (GHz). The symbol is short for "K-under" (originally ), because it is the lower part of the original NATO K band ...

antenna for communications and Doppler ranging experiments.

, RAIKO, FITSat 1, F-1, and TechEdSat-1 travelled to orbit aboard Kounotori 3 (HTV-3).WE WISH
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References

External links

Official web page
Spacecraft launched in 2012 CubeSats Student satellites Satellites deployed from the International Space Station {{Japan-spacecraft-stub