Northern SPIRIT Consortium - Canadian Collaboration through Student-Led CubeSat Constellation

The Northern Space Program for Innovative Research and Integrated Training (Northern SPIRIT) is a unique collaboration of three Canadian post-secondary institutions that will design, build, and operate a constellation of three CubeSats. The consortium, beginning in 2017, comprises Yukon University, Aurora College, and the University of Alberta (U of A). The partnership will develop three CubeSats: YukonSat (2U), AuroraSat (2U) and Ex-Alta 2 (3U) which will be launched into Low Earth Orbit in 2022. Northern SPIRIT strives to use space technology development to inspire motivated youth across Canada to engage in student-led collaboration and hands-on education, research, training, and to amplify Northern Canadian voices. Supported by the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) through the Canadian CubeSat Project (CCP), Northern SPIRIT will help further the CSAs goal of making space more accessible throughout Canada. The constellation mission will support a range of educational payloads dedicated to the expansion of STEM, arts, and language outreach opportunities. They also introduce passionate k-12 students to hands-on experiences with space mission concepts such as operations, coding, and data analytics. AuroraSat’s mission objective is educational outreach directed at sharing Northern art, languages, and history. Northern Images Mission will host a screen and an imager which will capture artwork created by Northern Artists backdropped by the Earth’s horizon. Northern Voices Mission will broadcast Northern Canadian stories of the space and sky, read by students, on amateur radio bands from all three satellites. Finally, the Northern Games Mission will transmit partial messages (focusing on Northern history) from the three satellites in select geographic zones, requiring global cooperation between amateur radio operators to decode a whole message. YukonSat will provide the novel opportunity to expand the capacity of highly qualified space science personnel in the Yukon, while furthering space science engagement and education of the public. The satellite’s payload will host a robotic arm, an OLED screen, camera, and a sensor array for attitude determination. The robotic arm allows freedom to point remote sensing equipment without using the spacecraft attitude determination and control system. The OLED screen and camera will display and photograph student-made Northern art with the Earth and space in the background. Ex-Alta 2 will host a multispectral imaging payload with the mission objective to study wildfires. A secondary science objective on all three satellites is space weather monitoring using a Digital Fluxgate Magnetometer that was designed and built at the U of A. In addition to this inter-institutional coordination, the U of A-designed 3U bus has been adapted into a 2U version to be used on the other two satellites in the constellation. The partnership amongst the three institutions supports collaboration in remote communities across Provincial & Territorial borders, advancing Canada’s contribution to the space industry and showcasing the exciting possibilities for interdisciplinary, national partnership. Extending across Canada, the consortium strives to inspire and enable passionate students to celebrate the Canadian voice and pursue opportunities in the space industry. In partnership with the CSA, Northern SPIRIT is a frontrunner in the exciting upward trend of the democratization of space.