Altius Space Machines

Altius Space Machines is a seed-stage startup company that is developing a novel rendezvous and capture technology for uncooperative satellites.[1] The company's products both enable, and are enabled by, the more recent lower-cost access to space epitomized by NewSpace launch companies such as SpaceX, Virgin Galactic and XCOR Aerospace.[2]

In July 2011, Altius Space Machines won first place in the 2011 NewSpace Business Plan Competition in Silicon Valley, sponsored by the Space Frontier Foundation.[1]

Altius won a contract with DARPA in July 2012 to build a composite extensible robotic boom arm for the DARPA Phoenix project.[3][4][5] They also began work in 2012 developing Gecko-adhesive grippers, as part of work to build a Gecko Gripper Touch-to-Grasp tool that incorporated JPL’s "synthetic Gecko adhesive technology that mimics the ability of Gecko lizards to adhere to walls." The work leveraged previous work done by Altius on uncooperative capture mechanisms using electroadhesion.[6][7]

In 2014, Altius began work on a magnetoshell aerocapture and aerobraking technology for cubesats. Called MIDAS, Multi-Purpose Interplanetary Deployable Aerocapture System, the 6U cubesats will be designed to be used on an interplanetary mission such as to Mars, Venus, or Jupiter’s moon Europa[8][9]

Other work includes the "Kraken Asteroid Boulder Retrieval System." In late 2014, Altius expects to test prototypes of grasping arms and non-force-closure gripper concepts for capturing a boulder off the surface of an asteroid. The study is funded by NASA as part of their broader Asteroid Redirect Mission (ARM) project, and is intended to mature system concepts and key technologies while assessing the feasibility of potential commercial partnerships for ARM.[10]

In 2015 Altius win contract to build :lightweight robotic manipulators, that utilize rollable composite STEM booms to provide a prismatic extension/retraction DOF, as robot arms for Assistive Free-Flyers (AFFs) on the International Space Station. These Low-Inertia STEM Arm (LISA) manipulators can provide comparable or better manipulation capabilities to AFFs than traditional robotic manipulators, but with less mass, lower inertia, better stowability, and the ability to reach into very hard-to-access locations.:[11][12]

References

  1. 1 2 Wall, Mike (4 Aug 2011). "Satellite Grappler Snags Top Space Business Prize". Business News Daily. Retrieved 12 Jun 2012.
  2. ↑ Foust, Jeff (2011-08-16). "The evolving ecosystem of NewSpace". The Space Review. Retrieved 2011-08-15. Since the term came into vogue about five years ago, supplanting the geekier “alt.space” moniker, it’s been most commonly associated with entrepreneurial ventures developing suborbital and orbital vehicles. ... While an exact, widely-accepted definition of NewSpace still eludes the space community, it’s increasingly clear that constraining the scope of NewSpace to vehicle developers is too limiting. ... SpaceX, Virgin Galactic, XCOR Aerospace, ... New companies are emerging that seek to develop technologies that can either enable or be enabled by low-cost access to space and thus can arguably be considered part of NewSpace. [Examples include] Altius Space Machines ... Masten Space Systems ... Innovative Space Propulsion Systems ... Celestial Circuits [and] Final Frontier Design. ... NewSpace ... is a way of doing business and NewSpace is an industry doing business in a new way. ... NewSpace is an industry that’s doing business for a purpose ... a NewSpace company is a company that is built, formed, operated by, funded by, or has as part of its business plan the opening of the space frontier, and making a profit while doing so ... It is the industrial engine that will power the movement towards a more fundamental goal of space settlement.
  3. ↑ http://www.universetoday.com/96371/darpa-moving-ahead-with-building-zombie-frankensatellites/
  4. ↑ http://www.defensedaily.com/publications/smr/Altius-Space-Machines-NovaWurks-Awarded-DARPA-Phoenix-Contracts_18879.html
  5. ↑ http://moonandback.com/2012/07/31/altius-space-machines-signs-darpa-phoenix-contract/
  6. ↑ Altius Space Machines Wins Contract to Develop Touch-to-Grasp Gripper with JPL, accessed June 28, 2014.
  7. ↑ Phoenix Gecko Gripper, accessed June 28, 2014.
  8. ↑ Altius Space Machines Displays MIDAS Touch with Deep Space CubeSats, accessed June 28, 2014.
  9. ↑ NASA Eyes Sending CubeSats into Deep Space, accessed June 28, 2014.
  10. ↑ NASA Selects 18 Proposals for Asteroid Redirect Mission Studies, accessed June 28, 2014.
  11. ↑ http://sbir.gsfc.nasa.gov/SBIR/abstracts/15/sbir/phase1/SBIR-15-1-Z5.01-9370.html
  12. ↑ http://www.parabolicarc.com/2015/05/12/altius-sbir/
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