xChips from XinaBox Launched in Space

April 17, 2019: over 40 satellites were launched into extreme low earth orbit, ferried on the second stage of an Antares rocket lifting off from Wallops Island, Virginia, USA, on its way to the International Space Station.

 

Each satellite had 8 xChips on board from XinaBox, connected together to create complex and robust digital instruments which would measure key atmospheric indicators. These instruments passed rigorous pre-launch qualified-for-space tests, including thermo-cycling, vibration and shock testing. 

 

The xChips onboard were powered by the CC03, an ARM Cortex-M0 32-bit MCU running at 48 MHz. It's extreme low-power made it ideal for use in space, with only limited solar power availability. This xChip core also incorporates the XinaBox boot loader which allows students to simply drag and drop compiled software onto the core as simply as moving files to a USB Thumb drive.

 

The other xChips included sensors which had already been used and tested by students in the classroom: starting with low-altitude ballooning projects then moving on to proper high altitude (>30km/100000ft) weather balloons. The sensors were:

From extreme low earth orbit (ELEO - up to 250Km high) all satellites in communication successfully transmitted data from all their xChips. This remarkable success means that the same xChips that are so simple and easy to use in a classroom are robust and professional enough to build genuine and viable satellites with.  Credit to the connector design and the redundancy in the XinaBox architecture.

 

For teachers interested in XinaBox: your learning tools need not be toys. Get started with our own high altitude balloon project with our XK07 STEM FlatSat kit

 

This news article from a local Virginia new station helps relive some of the excitement we all felt in the build up to the launch: