A CUBESAT simulator at the UPEC Space Campus

The UPEC Space Campus recently acquired a fully functional EyasSat nano satellite simulator. Designed to provide students with the opportunity to understand and explore the concepts of electrical, mechanical, software design as well as a perspective of the systems engineering. To do so they will use the subsystems and functionalities of the spacecraft simulator.

The simulator (EyasSat) is composed of six traditional satellite subsystems: structural, power supply (EPS), control and data processing (C&DH), communication (Comm), attitude determination and control subsystems (ADCS) and finally thermal subsystems.

EyasSat provided us with COSMOS, a software that allows us to communicate with the nano satellite via a mini radio station on the ground. We can receive data from different subsystems and send different commands to the nano satellite simulator.

This makes it possible to study, analyse and control the different systems separately in order to fully understand how the nanosatellite operates.

Article written by Daniel Kalinowski, head of the UPEC Space Campus ground station