GHSat

Before presenting our CanSat mission goals, we would like to share an inspiring quote from NASA astronaut Christa McAuliffe:

“Space is for everybody. It’s not just for a few people in science or math, or for a select group of astronauts. That’s our new frontier out there, and it’s everybody’s business to know about space”

– Christa McAulliffe, NASA astronaut and teacher who lost her life during the Challenger tragedy

These words inspired our team from the beginning of our project. We not only want to create something that works well and collects some kind of scientific measurement data, but something extraordinary.

And by extraordinary, we mean a project that ignites the spark of curiosity in younger generations and motivates them to take up challenges.

Primary mission

Our primary mission goals are mandated by the European CanSat Competition 2023 Guidelines. We are required to measure the following environmental data after separation and during ascent:

• air temperature
• air pressure

Our CanSat must be able to transmit these data packets with its onboard communications system at least once every second. For this, we will need to design and build a mobile ground tracking station, that will be operated by one team member and its sole purpose is to collect all data sent by our CanSat in-flight.

Secondary mission

In addition to the requirements of the primary mission, we have identified two main lines for data collection: extended telemetry and the general secondary mission data to be beamed back to our ground station in real-time and/or recorded on a data carrier during the flight. 

The extended telemetry mission package would include a GPS tracker to precisely determine the position of our CanSat. Furthermore, we plan to calculate our barometric altitude from the air pressure, and we would like to continuously monitor the battery voltage in our power system.

Our general secondary mission data collection process would include an integrated Geiger counter and an atmospheric gas sensor. The counter would measure beta- and gamma-radiation during the flight, which would later be analyzed together with the atmospheric gas sensor, which is planned to measure CO2 concentration in the air during our flight.

Public outreach campaign

As we stated above, our primary is to inspire the youth with our mission. During our brainstorming sessions, we came to the conclusion that we need a public outreach campaign. A heck of a good one.

That’s why we set up a group of social media sites:

• Facebook
• Twitter
• Instagram
• Flickr

Apart from this, our school’s social media sites are also promoting our content.

We would like to thank the Nadácia Biskupa Királya foundation and the Slovak Organization for Space Activities for supporting us in propelling Slovakia to the forefront of space education.