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

立方体卫星是小型化、低重量、低成本的卫星。由于这些特性，由10 -100颗立方体卫星组成的星座带有专门研究空间环境的仪器，为了解和预测空间天气提供了一个令人兴奋的新机会。具有可重构群的虚拟超分辨率光学（VISORS）任务通过设计、建造和操作三颗卫星，共同形成一个用于观测太阳的紫外线望远镜，支持使用立方体卫星星座进行空间天气的进步。VISORS采用了一种变革性的技术方法；它将是首个采用多项突破性技术的分布式望远镜，包括：新型光子筛光学、精确编队飞行和航天器之间受5g启发的高数据速率通信。该任务使用的转换光学将允许对纳米耀斑进行高时空观测，纳米耀斑可能是太阳日冕加热的重要来源。VISORS的使命是支持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，以支持可在教室中使用的立方体卫星的设计和优化。此外，虚拟望远镜的实际演示将在科学博物馆展出。这个项目源于“创意实验室：立方体卫星创新的跨领域倡议”，这是一个由地球科学、工程和计算机与信息科学与工程理事会支持的跨学科项目。VISORS将通过揭示窄至160毫弧秒的丝状日冕结构，在解决加热太阳日冕过程的起源方面提供革命性的飞跃，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，比迄今为止使用的间接方法更有力。除了解决地球空间科学中最基本的开放性问题之一外，VISORS还将验证几项突破性技术。技术创新包括演示首个具有空前角度分辨率的分布式紫外望远镜、新型光子筛光学系统和立方体卫星精确编队飞行，以及演示在立方体卫星群上进行亚公里近距离操作，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间群通信和网络。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知识价值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.