Vermont Lunar CubeSat
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The Vermont Lunar CubeSat is a
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 ...
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 ...
by
Vermont Technical College Vermont Technical College (Vermont Tech or VTC) was a public technical college in Vermont. Its main residential campuses were located in Randolph Center and Williston. In addition, there were regional campuses distance sites, and nursing campus ...
and funded in part by grants from
NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the federal government of the United States, US federal government responsible for the United States ...
and the Vermont Space Grant Consortium and in part by voluntary donations. The satellite, costing about US$50,000 to build — with NASA offering a free launch as part of the ELaNa program — served as a testing model for guidance and navigation pending future launches. The eventual goal of the project is to build a CubeSat capable of orbiting the Moon. It was launched on November 19, 2013, from
Wallops Flight Facility Wallops Flight Facility (WFF) is a rocket launch site on Wallops Island on the Eastern Shore of Virginia, United States, just east of the Delmarva Peninsula and approximately north-northeast of Norfolk, VA, Norfolk. The facility is operated ...
in
Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern and Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States between the East Coast of the United States ...
as part of a payload containing two NASA, 11 university, one high school, and 14 Air Force CubeSats. Vermont Lunar is the only non-NASA/USAF CubeSat from this ELaNa IV launch that is fully working. Eight were never heard from at all. SPARK/Ada 2005 was used, and this is the first spacecraft of any kind programmed in SPARK. The control software contained about 10,000 lines of SPARK/Ada code. The Principal Investigator was Carl Brandon, the Software Supervisor was Peter Chapin, and Dan Turner served as the Principal Developer. This was the first satellite of any kind built by a college or university in New England.


See also

;Lunar CubeSats in development: * Lunar IceCube * Lunar Flashlight * Lunar Polar Hydrogen Mapper


References

{{Use mdy dates, date=July 2014 Spacecraft launched in 2013 CubeSats