When the Space Launch System (SLS), NASA’s most powerful rocket to date, launched on November 15, 2022, four of MMA Design’s HaWK Solar Arrays await their turn to finally spread their wings to study the Earth, the Moon and beyond! Accompanying the important Artemis I payload of mannequins – in preparation for its ultimate human cargo when the US returns to the moon – 10 cubesats are hitching a ride as secondary payloads. Four of those missions will be powered by MMA HaWK Solar Arrays.
Image credits: NASA
BioSentinel, a collaboration with NASA Ames Research Laboratories, will demonstrate a biosensor to detect, measure, and correlate the impact of space radiation to living organisms over long durations beyond Low Earth Orbit (LEO). MMA’s BioSentinel HaWKs are a combination of two standard MMA HaWK configurations, one of which is actuated by our Solar Array Drive Assembly (SADA), for a combined 84 W of peak power.
The EQUULEUS mission HaWK configuration includes wings that are gimbaled on a common single axis of rotation using MMA’s SADA which spans the 1U x 2U face of the cubesat. The array provides 56 W of peak power. EQUULEUS, a University of Tokyo/JAXA mission that MMA was honored to work on, will measure the distribution of plasma surrounding the Earth’s plasmasphere to help scientists understand the radiation environment in that region.
In partnership with the team at Arizona State University, MMA delivered enhanced HaWK (eHaWK) Solar Arrays with 112 W of peak power in support of their LunaH-Map mission. Both wings are positioned using MMA’s SADA which spans the 1U width of the spacecraft. This mission, from ASU’s School of Earth and Space Exploration, searches for hydrogen deposits on the Moon’s south pole by creating higher-fidelity maps of near-surface hydrogen in craters and other permanently shadowed regions with neutron spectrometers.
And, working with JPL and NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center, NEAScout is a robotic reconnaissance mission headed beyond the moon. NEAScout will deploy a solar sail to fly by, and return data from, an asteroid representative of other near-earth asteroids (NEAs) that may one day be human destinations. MMA’s HaWK array will contribute 42 W of peak power for the NEAScout mission.
The greatly anticipated launch of SLS and Artemis I lead the way for future human exploration of the moon and, importantly, flight test four more MMA HaWK Solar Array configurations. MMA’s HaWK Solar Arrays lead the industry in high-performance space power solutions by delivering more watts per kilogram and more kilowatts per cubic meter for CubeSats as well as larger platforms.
Another pair of MMA’s High Watts per Kilogram “HaWK” solar arrays are poised to launch for the moon. Anticipated to launch this November on a SpaceX Falcon9 from Cape Canaveral, Lunar Flashlight will be the first mission to use a four-laser reflectometer to look for water ice on the Moon.
“This is an exciting time for lunar exploration. The launch of Lunar Flashlight, along with the many small satellite missions aboard Artemis I (on which MMA HaWK solar arrays are powering 4 other missions!), may form the foundations for science discoveries as well as support future missions to the Moon’s surface,” said Roger Hunter, Small Spacecraft Technology program manager at NASA’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley.
On October 7, 2022, another MMA dragNET De-orbit System launched on a RocketLab Electron as part of its only payload — the General Atomics GAzelle Satellite hosting a Radmon and an Argos-4 payload. Argos-4 will become part of the Argos constellation supported by the NOAA Cooperative Data and Rescue Services Program.
De-orbiting space debris recently became a hot topic of discussion again as the FCC unanimously approved a rule that requires satellites in low Earth orbit (LEO) to be disposed of in no more than 5 years post mission, significantly shortening the decades-old 25-year recommendation set forth by NASA in the 90s.
MMA’s dragNET De-orbit System has proven its effectiveness with the Minotaur I ORS Mission in 2013, which successfully de-orbited the upper stage of that launch vehicle within 2 years, besting the new FCC requirements.
Congratulations to our customer, DSO National Laboratories, and industry partner, Satrec Initiative, on the successful launch and deployment of the NeuSAR satellite. This pathfinder mission includes MMA’s next-generation DaHGR antenna Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) which will enable Singapore’s space operations to capture images day or night, and through heavy cloud cover or other weather conditions typically adverse for imaging.
NeuSAR was launched from India on June 30, 2022 aboard a Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV)-C53 from the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO).
As we look forward to the year ahead, we would like to wish each of you a very happy and prosperous New Year and thank you for your continued partnership and support.
In spite of all the “distributed teamwork” and zooming, facing the global challenges of the last couple of years has brought us together in unexpected ways. As an organization as well as an industry, we have discovered ways to push the boundaries of our curiosity, resilience and resourcefulness, to transcend those challenges with stellar success! This is a testament to the commitment, dedication and passion of each and every one of you who have contributed along this journey.
Reflecting on the accomplishments of the past year, we are reminded that our commitment to living our core values — where putting PEOPLE FIRST is central to our mission and success — will always be our north star. We are grateful for our team and the excellence they bring to bear in our work, and for our customers who trust in us to do what we do best. We look forward to another year of accomplishingMORE together!
Congratulations to Systems & Technology Research (STR) for having been awarded a key role on this exciting demonstration! MMA is thrilled to be on STR’s payload team for this DARPA mission. To learn more about the Blackjack program, click here to read the full press release from DARPA.
MMA is proud and excited to have provided critical space power to this NASA JPL technology demonstration mission which aims to look for water ice inside the moon’s darkest, coldest craters using lasers. Read more at Space Newsfeed.
FalconSat-7 is a technology demonstration mission to test a solar space telescope incorporating a membrane photon sieve deployed from a 3U CubeSat to image the sun. It took flight on early Tuesday morning, June 25, on a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket, along with over 2 dozen other small satellites.
FalconSAT-7 was a engineering collaboration between the United States Air Force Academy (USAFA), the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) and MMA. USAFA designed the photon sieve and spacecraft, while MMA designed, built and integrated the deployment mechanism which controls the accuracy of the photon sieve’s position and surface.
New missions, based on this technology, will make it possible to significantly reduce cost, with apertures (and hence resolutions) previously thought unobtainable. Due to its high packing ratios, this mission will prove that it’s possible to construct extremely compact satellites that are simple to manufacture and launch in large numbers with short lead times.
Another MMA HaWK Solar Array launched at 2 am Eastern on May 5th from New Zealand on a Rocket Lab Electron rocket. The Space Plug and Play Architecture Research CubeSat-1 (SPARC-1), a six-unit cubesat sponsored by the Air Force Research Laboratory in cooperation with the Swedish military, was one of three satellites hitching a ride yesterday. MMA’s HaWKs will provide critical space power to the SPARC-1 mission which is a technology demonstration aiming to test modular spacecraft avionics.
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