• Customer: Kindai University, MBA / JAXA
• Launch Vehicle: Northrup-Grumman Antares
• Launch Location: Wallops Island, Virginia
• Total spacecraft: 1

On Monday, November 7, 2022, at 2:32am PT, a Northrup Grumman Antares rocket lifted off from Wallops Island, VA. The Cygnus cargo freighter for NASA’s next resupply mission to the International Space Station. This launch marks Spaceflight’s eighth of the year and our 53rd overall, taking our 455th payload to space.

Photo credit: NASA

On board was SpaceTuna1, a 1U CubeSat developed by Japan’s Kindai University students to run an experiment to investigate the performance of retroreflective materials in space by using the satellite. For this research project, retroreflective material was mounted on the CubeSat, and the reflection characteristics will be observed by irradiating a laser from the ground. The CubeSat is also equipped with blue LEDs so that it can be observed from a telescope on the ground. The mission period is a half a year.

Photo credit: NASA