AFRL Develops Promising Space Object Detection Technique

  • Published
  • By Jeanne Dailey
  • Directed Energy
KIRTLAND AIR FORCE BASE, New Mexico --  Jeanne DaileyThe Air Force Research Laboratory's Satellite Assessment Center (SatAC) has developed a method to detect satellites using a small telescope at distances over three times farther than a geo orbit (over 70,000 mi.) and fainter than 14th magnitude. Earlier schemes for small-scope space object detection used a stacked series of long-exposure charge-coupled device (CCD) frames to reinforce faint images. AFRL's method uses the human eye's sensitivity to detect movement between frames by assembling images from an electron-multiplying (EM) CCD sensor into a full-motion video. The EMCCD amplifies light orders of magnitude, simulating a much larger apparent aperture. The SatAC used its 16-inch telescope with the EMCCD camera to demonstrate that it can detect and track distant space objects. This new approach can be of great benefit to the Joint Space Operations Center (JSpOC) in its mission need to detect, track, and identify man-made objects in space, providing a detection capability at a greatly reduced cost.

The proof-of-principle experiment using SatAC's 16-inch Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope showed that the method is directly applicable to other small telescopes. In addition to being less expensive, small telescopes fitted with an EMCCD camera can offer several advantages: they often can be operated by one person; they can be used to respond quickly to space events without scheduling a crew; they are transportable on commercial aircraft; they can be relocated readily to a favorable observation site; and they can be operated under fairly high wind conditions.

The AFRL SatAC small telescope effort continues to develop techniques, tools and processes to enhance space situational awareness. Future experiments will test small-telescope space object detection limits to distances well beyond the recent 70,000-mile record.