NSF Funds GuardianSat’s Orbital Debris Avoidance System Development

The National Science Foundation has awarded GuardianSat a Phase I Small Business Technology Transfer grant to accelerate the development of a sensor system designed for satellites to autonomously detect objects and avoid space debris.

GuardianSat will work on its Autonomous Satellite Orbital Debris Avoidance System in partnership with The Aerospace Corporation under a Phase I project, called Space Debris Awareness Spectrum Research. The effort involves exploring methods that onboard sensor systems can use to enable spherical space domain awareness, GuardianSat said.

The STTR Phase 1 funding will also advance the company’s Pathfinder project aiming to develop a system that monitors space debris, even those smaller than 10 cm in diameter, and predicts potential collisions. According to GuardianSat, existing debris tracking solutions use ground-based systems that can only detect space junk larger than 10 cm. 

The Phase 1 funding was awarded under the America’s Seed Fund program designed to support small businesses in developing and commercializing innovative technologies.