The Radiometer Atmospheric CubeSat Experiment (RACE) pre-launch performance

Author

Boon Lim ; Statham, Shannon ; Misra, Sidharth ; Clark, Jessica ; Donahue, Kenneth ; Steinkraus, Joel

Author_Institution

Jet Propulsion Lab., California Inst. of Technol., Pasadena, CA, USA

fYear

2015

fDate

17-22 May 2015

Firstpage

1

Lastpage

3

Abstract

The Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) developed Radiometer Atmospheric CubeSat Experiment (RACE) has a 183 GHz water vapor radiometer payload integrated on a 3U CubeSat platform. The radiometer utilizes a 35 nm InP HEMT low noise amplifier receiver with 2 internal calibration means. RACE advances the technology readiness level (TRL) of the various radiometer sub-systems to TRL 6. Pre-launch performance in terms of stability and calibration methodology will be presented and discussed. The RACE satellite was lost on the Orb-3 launch mishap, Oct 28^th 2014.

Keywords

III-V semiconductors; aerospace propulsion; artificial satellites; calibration; high electron mobility transistors; indium compounds; low noise amplifiers; radiometers; 3U CubeSat platform; HEMT low noise amplifier receiver; InP; JPL; Jet Propulsion Laboratory; Orb-3 launch mishap; RACE satellite; TRL; calibration methodology; frequency 183 GHz; radiometer atmospheric cubesat experiment; radiometer sub-systems; size 35 nm; stability; technology readiness level; water vapor radiometer payload; Band-pass filters; Calibration; Couplers; III-V semiconductor materials; Indium phosphide; Radiometry; Switches; CubeSats; Microwave radiometry; atmospheric sounding;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Microwave Symposium (IMS), 2015 IEEE MTT-S International

Conference_Location

Phoenix, AZ

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/MWSYM.2015.7167097

Filename

7167097