Raavana-1 was the first

Sri Lanka Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, also known historically as Ceylon, is an island country in South Asia. It lies in the Indian Ocean, southwest of the Bay of Bengal, separated from the Indian subcontinent, ...

n satellite. The

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 ...

-sized satellite was launched as part of the

Cygnus NG-11 NG-11, previously known as OA-11, is the twelfth flight of the Northrop Grumman robotic resupply spacecraft Cygnus (spacecraft), Cygnus and its eleventh flight to the International Space Station under the Commercial Resupply Services (CRS-1) co ...

mission to the

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

on 17 April 2019. On 17 June 2019, the satellite was deployed into orbit from the ISS.

Development

The research satellite was developed by Tharindu Dayarathna and Dulani Chamika Vithanage, scholars of Peradeniya University's Engineering Faculty and Asian Institute of Technology. The satellite was designed in Japan. It had a volume of about 1000 cubic centimetre and a mass of about 1.1 kg. The lifespan of the

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 ...

was about one and half years. The satellite took images of

and other countries near

. It used

magnetic torquers A magnetorquer or magnetic torquer (also known as a torque rod) is a satellite system for attitude control, detumbling, and stabilization built from electromagnetic coils. The magnetorquer creates a magnetic dipole that interfaces with an ambient m ...

to reduce its angular velocity.

Origin of the name

When naming the country's first satellite, Sanath Panaavanna, Director General and Engineer at the Center for New Technology - Arthur C. Clarke Institute of Sri Lanka, along with his two engineering students wanted to put forward an authentic name that represents Sri Lankan culture and history. Inevitably the name " Dadu Monara" ("දඬු මොණරය" in Sinhala) was a go-to choice. Dadu Monara is a flying device that appears in early Sri Lankan folklore and it is often accredited by historians to be the first aircraft ever created. However, due to the complexity of the word and the difficulty most non-native Sri Lankans would have with pronouncing this word, it was named after mythical King Raavana ( Sinhala: රාවණ රජතුමා ''Ravana Rajathuma''), who is said to have ruled Sri Lanka at the time the Dadhu Monara was built. King Raavana is a notable King in Sri Lankan mythology with many mythical stories in ancient Sri Lanka.

Launch

The satellite was handed over to

Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency The is the Japanese national Aeronautics, air and space agency. Through the merger of three previously independent organizations, JAXA was formed on 1 October 2003. JAXA is responsible for research, technology development and launch of satell ...

(JAXA) on 18 February, and the satellite was sent to International Space Station on 17 April at 2:16 a.m. Sri Lanka Standard Time, to be deployed from it later. The satellite was launched along with Nepal's first satellite, NepaliSat-1. The satellite orbited at an altitude of 400 kilometers and had five missions to complete. Raavana 1 was included in a third batch of satellites known as BIRDS-3 together with satellites from Nepal and Japan. Raavana 1 aimed to take fifteen pictures per day.

Mission

According to Nanosats' database, its missions were to "Provide ciphered short messages in its beacon in the 437 MHz band. Remote Data Collection based on low powered LoRa modulation for demonstration of remote data collection and processing onboard. Imaging mission for public outreach and awareness, Earth Magnetic Field measurement, Glue Mission: to find COTS alternative to expensive space glue and Active Attitude Stabilization as precursor to active pointing control for future CubeSat"

Specifications

''Section source'' * Country:

* Type: CubeSat, 1U * Organisation: Kyushu Institute of Technology * Oneliner: Remote Data Collection based on low powered LoRa modulation for demonstration.

References