Technion -- Israel Technology Institute in Haifa and the Israel Space Agency have announced that in late 2018, they will launch the world's first nanosatellite formation, Globes reported. A group of three nanosatellites developed in Israel, which will fly in controlled formation, will be launched by Dutch company Innovative Solutions In Space, which specialises in launching nanosatellites on the Indian PSLV (Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle).
The Adelis-SAMSON Project has been developed by a research team headed by Pini Gurfil, director of the Asher Space Research Institute and member of the Technion Faculty of Aerospace Engineering, and with the support of the Adelis Foundation and the Israel Space Agency. The goal is to prove that a group of satellites can fly in a controlled formation for one year while orbiting at an altitude of about 600 kilometers.
The satellites will be used to receive signals from Earth and calculating the location of the source of transmission for search and rescue operations, remote sensing, and environmental monitoring. The size of each satellite is 10 cm x 20cm x 30 cm, or about the size of a shoebox, and they weigh around 8 kilograms. They will be equipped with measuring devices, antennae, computer systems, control systems and navigation devices. The flight software and algorithms were developed in the Technion Distributed Space Systems Laboratory.