Rendering of EIRSAT-1 (copyright Eirsat)

Ireland is getting set for a historic moment as it has moved a step closer to launching its first satellite – Educational Irish Research Satellite 1 (EIRSAT-1). It was announced on Oct. 17 that Tánaiste Leo Varadkar and Minister of State for Business, Employment and Retail Damien English have signed an Exchange of Letters with the European Space Agency (ESA) to facilitate the launch of EIRSAT-1. The satellite has been designed and built by academic staff and students at the University College Dublin (UCD).

The satellite, which has a four-year lifespan, will be launched from French Guiana early next year. The 2U CubeSat is being developed as part of ESA’s Fly Your Satellite program.

There are three science experiments on board the satellite. The first experiment is a novel gamma-ray detector, GMOD, which is being developed in UCD. GMOD will detect gamma-rays from both cosmic and atmospheric phenomena. The second experiment, EMOD, consists of a payload developed with Irish company, ENBIO, to monitor the in-flight performance of their thermal spacecraft treatments, SolarWhite and SolarBlack. The third experiment, Wave Based Control (WBC), is a novel attitude control algorithm, developed in the UCD School of Mechanical and Materials Engineering, which will be tested for the first time in space on EIRSAT-1.

“This is a big moment for the Irish space sector as this is Ireland’s first mission into space. It has huge spin off potential for Irish businesses and universities. We have increased our financial contribution to the European Space Agency which is paid back in multiples in terms of contracts for Irish aviation and aerospace companies. EIRSAT-1 has been led by a talented team in UCD, and seen the development of space systems skills that did not previously exist in Irish industry or academia. It will position our nation to benefit from global space industry growth in the coming decades,” Damien English said in a statement.