Collaborative Research: CubeSat Ideas Lab: VIrtual Super-resolution Optics with Reconfigurable Swarms (VISORS)

立方体卫星是一种小型化、低重量、低成本的卫星。由于这些特性，由10颗-100颗立方体卫星组成的星座和专门用于研究空间环境的仪器为了解和预测空间天气提供了一个新的令人兴奋的机会。虚拟超分辨率光学和可重构群体(VISORS)任务通过设计、建造和运行三颗卫星，共同形成用于观测太阳的紫外线望远镜，支持利用立方体卫星星座进行空间天气的进步。Visors拥有一种革命性的技术方法；它将是第一个使用多项突破性技术的分布式望远镜，包括：新颖的光子筛光学系统、精确编队飞行以及航天器之间由5G启发的高数据速率通信。这次飞行任务使用的变革性光学系统将能够对纳米耀斑进行高空间和时间观测，这些耀斑可能是太阳日冕加热的一个重要来源。Visors任务支持STEM教育和公众宣传。研究生和本科生将积极参与所有任务阶段。该项目还将开发一个开源软件工具包，以支持可用于教室的CubeSat的设计和优化。此外，还将为科学博物馆的展览开发虚拟望远镜的动手演示。这个项目是由立方卫星创新中的IDEAS实验室：横切倡议产生的，这是一个由地球科学、工程、计算机和信息科学与工程主管支持的跨学科计划。VISORS将通过揭示窄至160毫角秒的丝状日冕结构，在解决日冕加热过程的起源方面实现革命性的飞跃，并利用这些结构的空间和时间特征来约束纳米耀斑的物理模型，比迄今使用的间接方法要强大得多。除了解决地球空间科学中最基本的开放问题之一，Visors还将验证几项突破性技术。这些技术创新从展示第一个具有前所未有的角度分辨率的分布式紫外线望远镜、新颖的光子筛光学系统和立方体卫星精确编队飞行，到演示立方体卫星群的亚公里近距离操作，包括低干扰推进机动；导航、控制和自主；以及受5G启发的高数据速率立方体卫星群间通信和组网。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

CubeSats are miniaturized, low-weight, low-cost satellites. Due to these properties, constellations of 10s-100s of CubeSats with specialized instruments for studying the space environment provide a new exciting opportunity to understand and predict space weather. The Virtual Super-resolution Optics with Reconfigurable Swarms (VISORS) mission supports the advancement of using constellations of CubeSats for space weather through designing, building, and operating three satellites that together form an ultraviolet telescope for observing the Sun. VISORS has a transformative technological approach; it will be the first distributed telescope using several breakthrough technologies, including: novel photon sieve optics, precision formation flying, and 5G-inspired high data rate communications between the spacecraft. The transformative optics utilized by the mission will allow high spatial and temporal observations of nanoflares that are potentially an important source of heating of the solar corona. The VISORS mission supports STEM education and public outreach. Graduate and undergraduate students will actively participate in all mission stages. The project will also develop an open-source software toolkit to support the design and optimization of CubeSat that can be utilized in classrooms. Further, a hands-on demonstration of the virtual telescope will be developed for a science museum exhibit. This project resulted from the Ideas Lab: Cross-cutting Initiative in CubeSat Innovations, an interdisciplinary program supported by Geosciences, Engineering, and Computer and Information Science and Engineering Directorates.VISORS will provide a transformational leap in addressing the origins of the processes heating the solar corona by revealing filamentary coronal structures as narrow as 160 milliarcseconds and use the spatial and temporal characteristics of those structures to constrain physical models of nanoflares much more powerfully than the indirect methods used to date. In addition to addressing one of the most fundamental open questions in geospace science, VISORS will validate several breakthrough technologies. The technological innovations range from the demonstration of the first distributed ultraviolet telescope with unprecedented angular resolution, novel photon sieve optics, and CubeSat precision formation flying, to the demonstration of sub-kilometer proximity operations on CubeSat swarms, including low-interference propulsive maneuvers; navigation, control, and autonomy; and 5G-inspired high data-rate inter-CubeSat swarm communication and networking.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.