• 12u cubesat
• cubesat
• microsatellite
• satellite
• space mission
• technology demonstration

The thesis is a preliminary design of a 12U Cubesat platform that will developed by the University of Pisa for ASI’s program “Future Missioni per Cubesats”.
After a first assessment of 12U Cubesat past and future missions, of Cubesats Commercial Off-the-Shelf (COTS) solar panels, structures and platforms, a list of European COTS components is created for the future development of the satellite.
A simplified Interface Control Document structure for Cubesats is created; meetings with payload representatives are done to investigate how to interface the payloads with the platform and to discuss the mission profile.
The main mission and subsystems requirements, a product tree and the systems scheme are defined. A mission analysis is performed in order to access the suitable orbits for the mission, also considering the satellite disposal. Then, a data and link budgets are made for the on-board and on-ground antennas preliminary design.
Most of the work is focused on the attitude and control system design: after a preliminary assessment of the components necessary for the mission, environmental perturbations along the orbit are calculated and, by means of a dynamic simulation, a closed-loop control is defined. Reaction wheels and magnetorquers are sized.