Antenna architecture of a nano-satellite for Radio Astronomy

Recent technological advancements have led to the emergence of a new miniaturized satellite platforms and this opened up the path for a whole new range of applications. The Orbiting Low Frequency Antennas for Radio Astronomy (OLFAR) project is one of these applications, and aims to develop a low-frequency radio telescope for the 0.3 MHz to 30 MHz band. It uses a swarm of 50 or more identical nano-satellites to synthesize a very large aperture to explore the ultra-long electromagnetic (EM) waves in this frequency band. The swarm will act similar to a wireless sensor network (WSN) that samples the cosmic noise, processes the data in a distributed manner, and then sends the data to a base station (BS) for further processing and analysis. The satellites will have a very simple architecture (characteristic of a WSN node) that will focus on three main functionalities: radio observation, data processing, and distribution (inter-satellite and downlink). However, the complexity of the application results in strict requirements for the design of the satellites components, especially for the antenna systems. Starting from OLFAR´s requirements and limitations, three separate antenna systems for scientific observation, inter-satellite link (ISL) and data downlink are designed and integrated into a nano-satellite platform.