In-orbit imaging a “game-changer” in space situational awareness
NASA’s Starling mission used four CubeSats in low-Earth orbit to test technologies that support swarm manoeuvre planning and execution and autonomous coordination between spacecraft. (Photo: NASA Ames Research Center / NASA)
As the threats of nuclear weapons in space and the militarisation of the domain persist, an Australian outfit has been developing technology that defence organisations could utilise to identify objects in space to gain a better understand of what they are doing in orbit.
Australia-based start-up HEO has been turning satellite Earth-observation cameras towards space to make hiding in orbit harder for adversary actors.
The company, founded in 2019 as a spin-out from the University of New South Wales in Sydney, raised US$8 million earlier this year to expand its services and launch new sensors to observe objects in space. The firm is currently buying time on existing Earth-observation satellites to image other spacecraft in orbit.
“We are using sensors on-board satellite platforms in orbit around the Earth, taking resolved images – not just dots in the background – so that we can actually
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