Principal Accomplishments

Millstone Hill RadarMillstone Hill Radar
  • The Space Systems Analysis Group was established to focus on system-level studies of the U.S. national space enterprise.
  • The Extended Space Sensor Architecture, a net-centric test bed for space situational awareness, had its first deliveries into the Joint Space Operations Center (JSpOC). This capability provides real-time radar images from the Haystack Auxiliary sensor to JSpOC operators.
  • A multistatic radar test bed consisting of Haystack and Haystack Auxiliary illumination radars (components of the Lincoln Space Surveillance Complex), three fixed received sites, and one transportable receive site began operations. The test bed was used to demonstrate wideband bistatic tracking and interferometric 3-D inverse synthetic aperture radar imaging of satellites in low Earth orbits.
  • Millstone Hill radars and the Space-Based Visible sensor have provided space situational awareness data to support more than 50 new launches in the past year.
  • Initial optical processing to shape each of the three large mirrors on the Space Surveillance Telescope (SST) has been completed. The telescope gimbal has been assembled. Operations of the SST are scheduled to begin in late 2009. The SST will possess advanced ground-based optical system capability to enable detection and tracking of objects in space while providing rapid, wide-area search capability.
  • The Haystack Ultrawideband Satellite Imaging Radar (HUSIR) low-power driver tube transmitter and signal processor were integrated with a small (2.4 meter) antenna and successfully used to collect data from large, low Earth-orbiting satellites. This early test confirms operational readiness for integration with a 37-meter-diameter dish antenna. The HUSIR system will add significant new imaging capability to our nation’s space situational awareness network.
  • Focal plane detectors and readout electronics were delivered for the Extreme ultraviolet Experiment sensor on NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory.
  • A novel 256 × 256 long-wave infrared detector array capable of supporting 30,000 frames per second with pixel-level digitization and image processing was fabricated. This technology will enable the next generation of nighttime wide-area surveillance.
  • Fabrication and initial testing were completed for an 880-megapixel visible wavelength imager that enables wide-area persistent surveillance at up to 10 frames per second.

 

 

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