INSPIRESat-1: An Ionosphere Exploring Microsat

The International Satellite Program in Research and Education’s (INSPIRE) first satellite is an ionosphere exploring microsat slated for launch in November of 2019 onboard an ISRO Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle. The microsat is a custom designed structure fitting on a PSLV ring deployer. The payload is the Compact Ionosphere Probe (CIP) which will take in-situ measurements of ion density, composition, temperature, velocity, and electron temperature. The CIP is a smaller version of the Advanced Ionosphere Probe (both developed in Taiwan) currently operating onboard the FORMOSAT-5. These instruments take measurements in four modes sampling the ionosphere at 1 or 8 Hz. The primary science objectives of the INSPIRESat-1 are twofold. First, enabling a greater understanding of the temporal and spatial distributions of small-scale plasma irregularities like plasma bubbles and second a characterization of the Midnight Temperature Maximum (MTM) in season, location, and time. In this paper, we present science expectations for the INSPIRESat-1 and consider the potential for coordinated measurements between three platforms carrying the same instrument (INSPIRESat-1, IDEASat/INSPIRESat-2, FORMOSAT-5). We also highlight the program management strategy used by the INSPIRE program in developing an internationally developed microsat

The INSPIRESat-1: mission, science, and engineering

INSPIRESat-1 (IS-1) is a small scientific satellite being developed jointly by the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics (LASP) at the University of Colorado at Boulder in the United States, the Indian Institute of Space Science and Technology (IIST) in India, the National Central University (NCU) in Taiwan and the Nanyang Technological University (NTU) in Singapore. This paper describes the science objectives of the IS-1 mission, the engineering and current development status. The IS-1 has completed all functional and performance tests as well as all environmental tests. The spacecraft is manifested on the Indian Space Research Organization's (ISRO) Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) C-52 mission in 2021. The IS-1 carries two scientific instruments: the Compact Ionospheric Probe (CIP) developed at NCU for studying Earth's dynamic ionosphere and the Dual-zone Aperture X-ray Solar Spectrometer (DAXSS) developed at LASP for studying the highly-variable solar X-ray radiation. It also carries a Command and Data Handling board developed by IIST. The primary science objectives of the INSPIRESat-1 are twofold. First, using CIP to characterize the temporal and spatial distributions of small-scale plasma irregularities like plasma bubbles in the ionosphere. Secondly, IS-1 aims to provide a greater understanding of why the Sun's corona is orders of magnitude hotter than the photosphere, why there is an abundance of elements change during different solar events, and how these events (observed with greater soft x-ray fidelity) affect the earth's ionosphere. The International Satellite Program in Research and Education (INSPIRE) is a consortium of universities with active space programs, formed to advance space science and engineering.Nanyang Technological UniversityThe INSPIRE program was created and IS-1 was primarily developed through funding from the University of Colorado INSPIRE grant. IIST acknowledges funding from the Indian Department of Space and support from the Indian Space Research Organization for funding and review. LCC acknowledges support from grants 105-2111-M-008 -001 -MY3 and 108-2636-M-008-002 from the Taiwan Ministry of Science and Technology, the Higher Education Deep Cultivation Grant for the NCU Center for Astronautical Physics and Engineering from the Taiwan Ministry of Education, and contract NSPO-S-106035 from the Taiwan National Space Organization. AC acknowledges support from NTU School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering Start-Up grant