Cheap spaceflight has ushered in an explosive growth era for Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellites. While this has brought us LEO satellite megaconstellations for ubiquitious highspeed data, it has also enabled a proliferation of nanosatellites (e.g. CubeSats) launched by diverse organizations. An unfortunate side-effect is harmful interference to sensitive receivers like those of radio astronomy — no place on Earth is safe. How can we enjoy the fruits of the satellite revolution without blinding ourselves to the secrets of the universe?
Networking is the key. This paper proposes InOrbitNet, which aggregates and backhauls traffic from low-capability nanosatellites using highly-capable LEO megaconstellations. By simulating LEO and nanosatellite orbit transitions, we show that orders-of-magnitude reductions in latency and significant increases in capacity are possible as compared to the current non-networked direct-to-ground approach. But more importantly, because LEO megaconstellations are highly capable and tightly managed, this consolidation of RF footprints also allows radio astronomy to be protected from interference.
