Maya-5 and Maya-6, the next two cube satellites (CubeSats) made in the Philippines, were sent to the International Space Station (ISS) on June 5, 2023, around 11:47 PM PST. As part of SpaceX’s 28th commercial resupply mission, the Maya-5 and Maya-6 spacecraft are on the SpaceX Falcon 9. Once they are sent into space, the CubeSats, weighing about 1.15 kilograms, will move in an orbit similar to the space station at approximately 400 kilometers.
The Maya-5 and Maya-6 CubeSats were built as part of the Space Science and Technology Proliferation through the University Partnerships (STeP-UP) project of the STAMINA4Space Programme. This project is funded by the Department of Science and Technology (DOST). It is run by the University of the Philippines Diliman (UPD) and the DOST Advanced Science and Technology Institute (DOST-ASTI). The nanosatellite track of the Master of Science (MS) or Master of Engineering (MEng) program of the Electrical and Electronics Engineering Institute (EEEI) of UPD is also run in partnership with the Kyushu Institute of Technology (Kyutech) in Japan and with the help of scholarships from the DOST-Science Education Institute (DOST-SEI).
Maya-5 and Maya-6 are the second set of CubeSats made by universities in the Philippines. Like their predecessors, they give people in the Philippines a chance to learn about space science and get hands-on experience making satellites. It is also meant to use better what can be done in the United States by switching to components, boards, and structure frames made locally.
The nanosatellite engineering track at the UP EEEI requires that the CubeSats be built as part of the training. Eight (8) students who earned scholarships from DOST-SEI are in the second group of STeP-UP scholars. Anna Ruth Alvarez, Joseph Jonathan Co, Ronald Collamar, Angela Clarisse Chua, Chandler Timm Doloriel, Khazmir Camille, and Angela Clarisse Chua are among them. Valerie Macaraeg, Gio Asher Tagabi, and Genesis Remocaldo.
How does Maya-5 compare to Maya-6?
The Maya-5 and Maya-6 CubeSats is a technology demonstration and educational platforms built for remote data collection through the Store-and-Forward (S&F) Mechanism, just like its predecessor, the Maya-2 satellite from Kyutech’s 4th Joint Global Multi-Nation Birds Satellite (BIRDS-4) Project, which will be turned off on July 5, 2022. The Cubesats use the same bus, but their missions and payloads differ. The mission payload of Maya-5 is the same as that of Maya-2, and the mission payload of Maya-6 is the experimental on-board computer (OBC-EX), which handles the attitude determination and control system (ADCS) and antenna (HNT) missions.
This is the 6th time satellites made by the Philippines and Japan together, like Diwata-1 and Diwata-2, have been sent into space successfully. The CubeSats are another nanosatellite our country has made and sent into space. Here are the satellites that came before the CubeSats and when they were launched, and when their missions ended:
- Maya-1 was sent into space on June 29, 2018; its mission ended on November 23, 2020.
- Maya-2 was sent into space on February 21, 2021. Its mission ended on July 5, 2022.
- Maya-3 and Maya-4 entered the room on August 29, 2021, and their missions ended on August 4, 2022.
Dr. Maricor Soriano, in charge of the STAMINA4Space program, also talked about how vital ecology is to the growth of space science and technology. “Building our CubeSats and coming up with new ideas with local businesses should pave the way for a base for the space technology industry. It is up to the government, the academic world, and business to keep this going,” she said.
STeP-UP Project Leader Engr. Paul Jason Co also said that a milestone like this would not have been possible without the help of DOST and DOST-SEI, whose dedication to improving our country’s SSTA capabilities has helped speed up the work of our country’s space scientists and engineers.
Dr. Franz De Leon, who is in charge of DOST-ASTI, also said that we would develop new ways to make power with the knowledge and experience our scholars, scientists, and researchers have gained. This will lead to many more technological breakthroughs in space, not just for the country but soon for the whole world.
What follows?
Once Maya-5 and Maya-6 are in place, they will be run by the Philippine Universities Ground Archiving and Data Reception (PUGAD) station in UPD.
Maya-7 is a 2U CubeSat currently being built as part of PhilSA’s ACCESS Nanosat Project (Advancing Core Competencies and Expertise in Space Studies Nanosat Project). ACCESS Nanosat began in September 2022, giving Filipinos a chance to get a master’s degree at the EEEI by taking classes in satellite engineering. In this project, researchers and students work together to create and build the Maya-7 CubeSat.
The ACCESS Nanosat team is also working closely with the winners of the Nanosat Mission Idea Contest (NMIC). The NMIC winners are building the payloads for their planned missions, which will then be added to Maya-7.