CubeSOTA Spacecraft

10 Gbit/s lasercom terminal for intersatellite links with GEO and downlinks to ground.

Demonstration mission to test the technologies needed to perform lasercom between LEO and GEO while achieving data rates as high as 10 Gbit/s. The mission is called CubeSOTA as a continuation of the SOTA achievements.

6U CubeSat platform was selected to accommodate the bus system in ~3U and the lasercom payload in the other ~3U. Its deployment was assumed to be done from the Japanese Experiment Module (JEM) in the International Space Station (ISS) by using the JEM Small Satellite Orbital Deployer (J-SSOD).

The launch is foreseen to be during 2023, approximately one year after ETS-9 launch, with an operation longer than 6 months (total lifetime of a 6U CubeSat launched to a 400-km orbit is ~1.5 years.
Some of the biggest challenges are the extremely-low size, weight and power available in the CubeSat, the accurate pointing precision required for the lasercom link, and the difficulties of closing the link at such a high speed as 10 Gbit/s.