CubeSat
The CubeSat made in this project was designed to monitor the degradation of the Great Barrier Reef off the coast of Australia. By incorporating a two-part payload consisting of a high-resolution camera and a microwave radiometer, the spacecraft was designed to collect images of the coral reef and record sea surface temperature (SST) measurements. This data would then be used to accurately track reef degradation to inform scientists, conservationists, and the general public as well as influence law-making related to the coral reefs. The benefit of implementing both payload instruments in one spacecraft is that it would be easier to determine when there is a real coral bleaching event versus an anomaly in imaging or data collection. Additionally, the combination would create the possibility of developing an early warning system for reef degradation using patterns found in the data. Most of the modeling in this individual project was done using MATLAB.
