STARS 2 --> Gennai

Spacecraft nº:

Japanese spacecraft nº: 193

Launch data:

Description:

• Kagawa University's STARS 1 (Space Tethered Autonomous Robotic Satellite), also known as Kukai, consists of a Mother Satellite and a Daughter Satellite connected by a tether. The Mother Satellite (Ku) deploys the tether having the Daughter Satellite (Kai) at its end. Daughter Satellite has one arm, and the tether is attached at its end. Then attitude control by arm motion using tether tension is possible. Main mission is to take pictures of a satellite during tether deployment.
  When the tether is deploys succesfully, it will be 300 metres long.
• The objectives of the mission are that the Mother Satellite deploys tether having Daughter Satellite at its end; Daughter Satellite controls attitude of CCD camera by robot motion; Mother Satellite and Daughter Satellite communicate through Bluetooth. The Daughter Satellite takes pictures of the Mother Satellite, and transmittes these to ground stations through amateur radio frequency.
• STARS 2 is an improved version of STARS 1 (2009-002G)

Mission details:

• Kagawa University's STARS-II satellite has been renamed Gennai after the Japanese polymath Hiraga Gennai (1728-1780). Based on the orbital decay rate, the Kagawa team believes that the 300m tether has been deployed (April 2014).