ESA - Next artificial intelligence mission selected 4 Sep 2020,...

ESA - Next artificial intelligence mission selected
4 Sep 2020, 10:51 a.m.


ɸ-sat-1, an enhancement of the Federated Satellite Systems mission, was launched onboard a Vega rocket from Europe’s spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, on 3 September at 02:51 BST/03:51 CEST (22:51 on 2 September, Kourou local time). ɸ-sat-1, pronounced PhiSat-1, will demonstrate how satellite data, coupled with advanced onboard digital technologies, can bring benefits to business, industry and science. The next step, the ɸ-sat-2 mission, will further demonstrate the capabilities of artificial intelligence (AI) technology for Earth observation. The use of these technologies will lead to new ways of collecting, distributing and analysing data about our planet. Building on the experience from the development of the Φ-sat-1 experiment, ESA released a Φ-sat-2 call for proposals for mission ideas mid-November 2019. After careful consideration, a panel of ESA experts selected the mission proposed by a consortium – led by Open Cosmos – as the winning idea. Their proposal involved an Earth observation 6U CubeSat platform capable of running AI apps that can be developed, easily installed, validated and operated on the spacecraft during their flight using a simple user interface. The mission will address a wide range of AI applications including: transforming a satellite image to a street map, cloud detection in order to reduce the volume of data to be downlinked to the ground, autonomous detection and classification of maritime vessels, as well as forest monitoring and anomaly detection. The spacecraft will fly in a sun-synchronous orbit with a powerful multi-spectral optical camera with an expected 4.75 m ground resolution. The payload ...