ARGO2.0 is a compact, scalable multi-camera Star Tracker System designed for small platforms, including CubeSats, offering high accuracy and reliability for attitude determination.
ARGO-2 High Performance Star Tracker System (HSTS-2)
ARGO2.0 is a compact, scalable multi-camera Star Tracker System designed for small platforms, including CubeSats, offering high accuracy and reliability for attitude determination.
Description
ARGO2.0 is a very compact multi-camera Star Tracker System, comprising of up to three 4Mpixel resolution cameras and one compact electronic unit for their interconnection and data processing. The system has been conceived as a reliable and accurate Star Tracker System for very small platforms, in particular also for CubeSat. The system is characterized by a high scalability, by offering different levels of accuracy and reliability, depending on the number of adopted cameras. ARGO2.0 has been developed in the framework of an ESA Program, primed by EICAS, for which TSD has contributed by developing FPA and the Camera Electronics. ARGO2.0 collects significant results obtained by TSD through the development of ARGO 1.0, but it required a complete re-design of the FPA and Camera Electronics, so to reach a further reduction of the SWAP (Size, Weight and Power) and costs and at the same time to keep the performance and the reliability as close as possible to the original architecture. Thanks to a proprietary design, the focal plane is thermo-mechanically decoupled from the rest of the structure, thus guaranteeing a very stable positioning of the FPA with respect to the overall camera assembly. ARGO2.0 can be configurated in a multicamera version with up to 3 Optical Heads in order to allow intelligent real-time data fusion of data coming from the cameras and allow smart in-flight relative camera attitude calibration. The multicamera system can be interconnected by means of a Data Processing Unit (DPU), responsible to run the Data Fusion software. Such DPU is a compact, lightweight unit based on last-generation mid-range density low-power consumption FPGA from the Microsemi PolarFire family. The careful selection of materials and components, supported by specific radiation testing performed by TSD, allows the DPU to be tolerant to a TID >20Krads, and a good resistance to Single Events is guaranteed by implementing latch-up protection circuitry for the most sensitive parts.
Specifications
| Number of cameras | Up to three 4Mpixel resolution cameras |
|---|---|
| Dpu dimensions | 95 mm x 94 mm x 22 mm |
| Dpu mass | ~250 g |
| Dpu power consumption | About 3 W @5VDC |
| Dpu interfaces | RS422 and SpaceWire I/F |
| Dpu radiation tolerance (TID) | >20Krads |
