Space team’s cubesat earns honor

Rice’s Students for the Exploration and Development of Space team was runner-up in this month’s national Astranis SEDS Sat-2 competition to win a cube satellite launch.

The Rice students’ OwlSat is designed to analyze the relationship between solar activity and the Earth’s lower atmosphere to enable comprehensive predictions for space debris and small satellites. The Rice satellite would also measure the levels of ionizing radiation from the sun at low-Earth orbit to help plan for the health of astronauts during extreme solar weather events.

The competition took place at SpaceVision, the SEDS-USA national conference, at Arizona State University.

From left, members of the team include Ryan Udell, Alejandro Rodriguez, Juan De La Garza, Paul Glenski, Feni Pandya, Eric Yang, Doug Steinbach and Hoik Jang. Missing from the photo are Alp Yakici and Lianne Johnson. Photo by Jeff Fitlow