FSSCat Mission Description and First Scientific Results of the FMPL-2 Onboard 3CAT-5/A

• Main Authors: Camps, A., Munoz-Martin, J.F., Ruiz-de-Azua, J.A., Fernandez, L., Perez-Portero, A., Llaveria, D., Herbert, C., Pablos, M., Golkar, A., Gutierrrez, A., Antonio, C., Bandeiras, J., Andrade, J., Cordeiro, D., Briatore, S., Garzaniti, N., Nichele, F., Mozzillo, R., Piumatti, A., Cardi, M., Esposito, M., Dominguez, B. Carnicero, Pastena, M., Filippazzo, G., Reagan, A.
• Format: Conference Proceeding
• Language: English
• Subjects: artificial neural networks; Earth; GNSS-R; Microwave FET integrated circuits; Microwave integrated circuits; Microwave radiometry; Microwave technology; sea ice concentration; sea ice thickness; Soil moisture; Space vehicles
• ISSN: 2153-7003
• DOI: 10.1109/IGARSS47720.2021.9554589

FSSCat, the "Federated Satellite Systems/ 3 Cat-5" mission was the winner of the 2017 ESA S^3 (Sentinel Small Satellite) Challenge and overall winner of the Copernicus Masters competition. FSSCat consists of two 6 unit cubesats carrying on board UPC's Flexible Microwave Payload - 2 (FMPL-2), an L-band microwave radiometer and GNSS-Reflectometer implemented in a software defined radio, and Cosine's HyperScout-2 visible and near infrared + thermal infrared hyperspectral imager, enhanced with PhiSat-1, a on board Artificial intelligence experiment for cloud detection. Both spacecrafts include optical and UHF inter-satellite links technology demonstrators, provided by Golbriak Space and UPC, respectively. This paper describes the mission, and the main scientific results of the FMPL-2 obtained during the first three months of the mission, notably the sea ice concentration and thickness, and the downscaled soil moisture products over the Northern hemisphere.