MinXSS CubeSat Deployed By NASA To Study The Sun's Soft X-Rays

On May 16, 2016, the Miniature X-Ray Solar Spectrometer, or MinXSS CubeSat was deployed from an airlock on the International Space Station to start its journey into space. NASA has funded MinXSS to study emissions from the sun that may affect the communication system on Earth.

The CubeSat is set to operate for up to 12 months. It observes soft X-rays that can disrupt the Earth's upper atmosphere and block radio GPS signals traveling through the region. The intensity of the soft x-ray emissions emitted from the sun is changing continuously over a large range, with a peak emission levels happening during large eruptions on the sun called solar flares.

According to Gadgets 360, the data from the CubeSat will help experts understand the physics behind solar flares. The soft X-rays carry information about the temperature, density, and chemical composition of material in the Sun's atmosphere, allowing scientists to detect how events like flares and other processes heat materials surrounding the Sun's atmosphere.

CubeSats are a new and cheap tool for space science missions. Instead of the traditional space science missions that transport a significant amount of custom-built, advanced level instruments, this bread loaf-sized MinXSS CubeSats are designed to take narrowly targeted scientific observations using only a few instruments which are commonly built from commonly seen components.

For example, MinXSS uses a commercially purchased X-ray spectrometer for a detector and an extendable tape measure as a radio antenna. The MinXSS development program was funded by the NASA Science Mission Directorate CubeSat Initiative Program and implemented by the University of Colorado Boulder under the leadership of Principal Investigator Tom Woods, phys.org reported.

MinXSS was launched via the NASA CubeSat Launch Initiative program on Dec. 6, 2015, aboard Orbital ATK's Cygnus spacecraft through NASA's Commercial Resupply Services contract. Since its inception in 2010, the CSLI has selected more than 120 CubeSats for launch and deployed 43 small satellites as part of the agency's Launch Services Program's Educational Launch of Nanosatellite Missions.