ARCSTONE Space Flight Hyperspectral Instrument

By Mike Stebbins, COO & Optomechanical Engineer - February 22, 2024

In early January 2024, Resonon delivered the ARCSTONE space-flight instrument to NASA Langley Research Center (LaRC). The ARCSTONE instrument was designed and built at Resonon and will be calibrated and then integrated into a 6U CubeSat (from Blue Canyon Technologies). The instrument is currently scheduled for launch into Low Earth Orbit in Q2 2025.

Figure 1: The ARCSTONE space flight hyperspectral instrument mounted in the fixture used for transport and testing.

The ARCSTONE hyperspectral instrument will ultimately provide a new lunar calibration standard to be used by Earth-viewing satellite instruments.

The ARCSTONE Mission

By precisely measuring the lunar reflectance from Low Earth Orbit, ARCSTONE will enable the Moon to become a more accurate calibration source for Earth-viewing satellite instruments. The ARCSTONE instrument will improve the spectral calibration of the Moon by a factor greater than 10. This will lead to improved understanding of complex terrestrial systems, such as weather and climate change, while also reducing the cost and complexity of future Earth-viewing satellite instruments.

Instead of future missions needing to bring calibration sources along in the satellite, to achieve high-accuracy calibration, future Earth-viewing satellites will be able to take images of the Moon and use the data from ARCSTONE to calibrate their instruments. This will reduce costs and improve accuracy for future imaging satellite programs.

Figure 2: Conceptual illustration of the ARCSTONE instrument, the objective of which is to determine the lunar spectral reflectance from space with high accuracy by measuring irradiances from the Sun and Moon directly from a 6U CubeSat. (spacecraft bus image courtesy Blue Canyon Technologies).

The ARCSTONE instrument was selected by NASA’s Earth Science and Technology Office (ESTO) for their In-Space Validation of Earth Science Technologies (InVEST) program. The ARCSTONE Principal Investigator is Dr. Constantine Lukashin, NASA LaRC.

Resonon is collaborating on the project with NASA LaRC, Quartus Engineering, the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics (LASP), Blue Canyon Technologies, US Geological Survey (USGS), and NASA Goddard Space Flight Center.

ARCSTONE Project History

Two ground-test prototypes of the ARCSTONE instrument (shown below) were developed in collaboration with NASA.

Figure 3: The first ARCSTONE ground test prototype, delivered from Resonon in 2019.

Figure 4: The second ARCSTONE ground test prototype, delivered from Resonon in 2021.

More Details

The following articles provide a great deal more information on ARCSTONE, including the optical and mechanical design paradigms used, fabrication methods, and test results from the prototype instruments.

References

ARCSTONE: Calibration of lunar spectral reflectance from space. Prototype instrument concept, analysis, and results.

Hans Courrier, Rand Swanson, Constantine Lukashin, Christine Buleri, John Carvo, Michael Cooney, Warren Davis, Alexander Halterman, Alan Hoskins, Trevor Jackson, Mike Kehoe, Greg Kopp, Thuan Nguyen, Noah Ryan, Carlos Roithmayr, Paul Smith, Mike Stebbins, Thomas Stone, Cindy Young, "ARCSTONE: calibration of lunar spectral reflectance from space. Prototype instrument concept, analysis, and results," J. Appl. Rem. Sens. 17(4) 044508 (1 November 2023) https://doi.org/10.1117/1.JRS.17.044508

Primary aberrations and the optical layout of the ARCSTONE spectrometer.

Mike Kehoe, Hans Courrier, and Slater Kirk "Primary aberrations and the optical layout of the Arcstone spectrometer", Proc. SPIE 12798, International Optical Design Conference 2023, 127982M (14 September 2023); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2692544

The ARCSTONE Project to Calibrate Lunar Reflectance.

R. Swanson et al., "The ARCSTONE Project to Calibrate Lunar Reflectance," 2020 IEEE Aerospace Conference, Big Sky, MT, USA, 2020, pp. 1-10, doi: 10.1109/AERO47225.2020.9172629

Structural, Thermal, and Optical Performance (STOP) analysis of the NASA ARCSTONE instruments.

Christine Buleri, Mike Kehoe, Constantine Lukashin, Trevor Jackson, Jeff Beckman, Adam Curtis, Britney Edwards, Trevor Owen, Adam Phenis, Mike Stebbins, "Structural, Thermal, and Optical Performance (STOP) analysis of the NASA ARCSTONE instruments," Proc. SPIE 10925, Photonic Instrumentation Engineering VI, 1092503 (4 March 2019); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2506656

Contact us

Mike Stebbins

COO & Optomechanical Engineer

Mike Stebbins is the Chief Operating Officer and an Optomechanical Engineer at Resonon. He holds a Master’s degree in Mechanical Engineering and brings 20 years of diverse experience across aerospace structures, robotics, software, and hyperspectral systems to his role.

He enjoys seeing all the innovative ways customers use hyperspectral imaging to solve tough and important problems.

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