Spheres

SPHERES

The Synchronized Position Hold, Engage, Reorient Experimental Satellites (SPHERES) experiment is a testbed consisting of three 8-inch-diameter (200 mm) miniaturized satellites that can operate in a variety of environments, including inside the International Space Station (ISS). The MIT Space Systems Laboratory developed the experiment to provide the Air Force and NASA with a long term, replenishable, and upgradable testbed for formation flight. It will be used to validate high risk control, metrology, and autonomy technologies. The technologies are critical to the operation of distributed satellite and docking missions such as TechSat21, Starlight, Terrestrial Planet Finder, and Orbital Express. The SPHERES concept was inspired by the Training Remotes from Star Wars.

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Famous quotes containing the word spheres:

    “The world has already learned that woman has other virtues than meekness, patience, humility and endurance. She possesses courage above all fear, and a will that knows no obstacles; and when these are called forth by some great emergency, false modesty is trampled in the dust, and spheres are scattered to the winds.”
    —A. Holley, U.S. women’s magazine contributor. The Lily, p. 38 (May 1852)

    “Perhaps a modern society can remain stable only by eliminating adolescence, by giving its young, from the age of ten, the skills, responsibilities, and rewards of grownups, and opportunities for action in all spheres of life. Adolescence should be a time of useful action, while book learning and scholarship should be a preoccupation of adults.”
    —Eric Hoffer (1902–1983)

    “It launch’d forth filament, filament, filament, out of itself,
    Ever unreeling them, ever tirelessly speeding them.

    And you O my soul where you stand,
    Surrounded, detached, in measureless oceans of space,
    Ceaselessly musing, venturing, throwing, seeking the spheres to connect them,
    Till the bridge you will need be form’d, till the ductile anchor hold,
    Till the gossamer thread you fling catch somewhere, O, my soul.”
    —Walt Whitman (1819–1892)