Posted on Saturday, February 11, 2012
By Makubex
Update: Watch the Live Stream of the launch.

On Feb 13, 2012 Vega will lift off from Europe's spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana. Vega will release nine satellites into orbit.

The payload consists of two Italian satellites ASI’s LARES laser relativity satellite and the University of Bologna’s ALMASat-1 and seven CubeSats provided by European universities from Italy, Romania, Hungary, Poland, France and Spain. The CubeSat is 10x10x10 cm and 1 kg in mass.

ASI’s LARES laser relativity satellite is built by Carlo Gavazzi Space SpA. LARES will improve their measurements of the Lense–Thirring effect by a factor of 10. The Lense–Thirring effect is the part of Albert Einstein’s theory of general relativity that describes the distortion of space-time caused by the rotation of a body with mass.

ALMASat-1 is a 12.5 kg technology demonstration microsatellite developed and built by the University of Bologne. The main objective of this first mission is to test the key performance of this low-cost multipurpose bus to prepare for future missions, such as 3-axis pointing accuracy.


Image Credit: ESA

Source: ESA

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