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Call for ESA Summer of Code in Space 2016! ESA awards stipends of €4000 to selected students (please Forward)
05/04/2016 at 21:52 • 0 commentsThe fourth year in a row, AerospaceResearch.net[0] is proud to be selected as an official mentoring organization for the Summer of Code in Space 2016 (SOCIS) program run by the European Space Agency (ESA).
And we are now looking for students to spend their summers coding on great space software, getting paid €4000 by ESA, releasing scientific papers about their projects and supporting the open-source space community.
Until 15 May 2016, students can apply for an hands on experience with applied space programs. With a project by the Institute for Photogrammetry (IFP) at the University of Stuttgart, we are offering you various coding work[1] on:- The Distributed Ground Station Network - global tracking and communication with small-satellites[2]
- or your very own proposal!
If you are a student, take your giant leap into the space community and the chance to be recognized by ESA headhunters.
If you are professor, feel free to propose this great opportunity to your students or even have your projects being coded and realized!During the last years, we mentored more than 20 students during Summer of Code campaigns[4] and now, we have released several papers, spent computing power worth 60,000 PCs to those students projects[2] and even helping their bachelor theses, and we had been on plenary stage with Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield to promote those projects during the International Astronautical Congress 2014 in Toronto. We want to repeat that success, and now it's your turn.
Apply today, find all projects on the ESA SOCIS webpage![1]
We are waiting for you,Andreas Hornig, Head of Platform
[0] http://aerospaceresearch.net/index.php/2016/04/09/esa-socis2016-ideas-for-aerospaceresearch-net/
[1] http://sophia.estec.esa.int/socis2016
[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TC4Ls3AGHf4
[3] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FY0vjbBp4eg
[4] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gkklxZxjT-8&list=PL-lXf3kTWgqybFL-VOmVxKyjnrVPE7DBBFeel free to forward this email to whomever you think it may concern!
### More Information ###
# About ESA Summer of Code in Space (SOCIS):
SOCIS "aims at offering student developers stipends to write code for various space-related open source software projects. Through SOCIS, accepted student applicants are paired with a mentor or mentors from the participating projects, thus gaining exposure to real-world software development scenarios. In turn, the participating projects are able to more easily identify and bring in new developers."[1]# About AerospaceResearch.net:
We are a DGLR young academics group at the University of Stuttgart for aerospace related simulations applying distributed computing. Our global citizen scientists community of 15,000 users are donating their idle computing time of 60,000 computers and forming a virtual super computer connected via the Internet. And this massive network is used for solving difficult space numerics or for sensor applications. We are bringing space down to Earth and supporting the space community from students to organizations.[0]# Distributed Ground Station Network [DGSN]:
The Distributed Ground Station Network is a system for tracking and communication with small satellites and other aerial vehicles. The concept includes a global network of small and cheap ground stations that track beacon signals sent by the satellite, plane or balloon. The ground stations are located at ordinary people at home, so called citizen scientists, and are connected via the Internet. A broadcasted beacon signal is received by at least 5 stations and can be used then for trilateration to obtain the position of the signal's origin. For this each ground station correlates the received signal with the precise reception time, which is globally provided and synchronized by GPS. This shall help small satellite provider and even Google's Loon project to be able to track their vehicles fast, globally and simple! -
After #DataBootCamp for SpaceApps Challenge Stuttgart, we received ISS and NOAA
04/17/2016 at 21:22 • 0 commentsThis weekend, we had the final #DataBootCamp for NASA Space Apps Challenge Stuttgart 2016 in shackspace. shackspace is Stuttgart's hackerspace and we meet there to build the DGSN.
So we didn't had much timeto work on DGSN because we also helped the Space Apps teams realizing their project ideas. That is why we like the hackerspace, meeting other space enthusiasts like us and getting involved.
So the #DataBootCamp was fun and we are eagerly looking forward for the Space Apps Chalenge hackathon next Weekend (23/24 April). Feel kindly invited to join when you will be around. Everybody can hack space!
But we also found time to test the cuttentground station hardware with the ISS beacon signal and the NOAA weather "fax". What you see below is the NOAA signal displayed by SDR# and below, the FFT we did to find it ourself in our python software. So they look similar. That was good news. It is essential to get the recorded IQ-Signal processed by our software. This is the first step in our DGSN system, Recording the RF-Signal. The next one is time correlation of the RF-signal.
What you can also see is the tricky part, the Doppler-Shift. The Waterfall diagram looks like the lines are moving leftwards, because they do due to the relative velocity of the sat to our station. We are currently programming the compensation for it.
You see, we are constantly baby-stepping forward.... stay tuned!
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Visiting the KSat team and playing with their re-entry capsule!
04/06/2016 at 22:52 • 0 commentsWe had been at the University of Stuttgart and visiting the KSat team. They are building this little fellow. It is a capsule that will be deployed from a high sounding rocket and performing rentry demonstration for the real mission.
The real mission is a cubesat in low earth orbit (about 400-600 km above ground) also having its own capsule that will re-entry even faster through the atmosphere and performing measurements. Then, the white side (heat shield) is in fligh direction and protecting it from high temperatures due to air and plasma friction.
With DGSN, we want to help them find their capsule when it is landing. Andof course tracking it during reentry. For that, we recorded the beacon signal transmitted by the small antennas pointing out of the grey glue. The signal you can see below is a simple on of key of constant wave form. In short, it is like morse code, but slower and without the code.
We should be able to track it!
PS: The capsule already flew with the REXUS sounding rocket and had been ejected and performed the reentry. Congratz, team KSat!