Flying Laptop 7 years in orbit

Flying Laptop continues with valuable contributions even after his mission has been completed

On July 14, 2017,  Flying Laptop launched from Baikonur in Kazakhstan at 8:36 CEST on Soyus/Fregat rocket. Commissioning in space was completed after just four days amd the first image could be downloaded just one day later. The small satellite was originally designed to last two years.

The Flying Laptopwas initiated in 2004 at the University of Stuttgart by Prof. Hans-Peter Röser as part of his small satellite program. With the new professorship for satellite technology established in 2015, Prof. Sabine Klinkner took over the project in January 2015.                                                  Flying Laptop is the largest small satellite launched by a German university and with a mass of 110 kilos also the largest and most complex satellite system, developed by doctoral candidates and students.

The objectives of Flying Laptop are the test and verification of new technologies, e.g. a reconfigurable FPGA onboard computer, a novel unfolding meachanism and a GPS experiment, as well as scientific earth surveillance. Additionally, with the DLR's OSIRISv1 there is a payload for communication and navigation for an optical data link installed.

After 7 years, it still provides data from space that can be used for e.g. agricultur and important telemetry that helps further develop data transmission technologies.

The communication with the ground stations is done with the SSTRC-1100 TMTC unit of STT-SystemTechnik GmbH.