The flight software is the heart of a spacecraft. It dictates every action that the spacecraft takes. Because of this, it’s critical to ensure that the software is robust, and that it can support the mission in every possible way. Not only is the code itself important, but the way the software is managed and comes together is significant as well. Today’s episode features a roundtable discussion between myself, Craig Knoblauch, and Vivek Chacko as we discuss the lessons we learned over the years in developing the flight software for the Phoenix CubeSat.

Due to the length of the discussion, I split this episode up into two different parts. This episode (Part 1) covers the architecture of our flight software, how we organized development, and the technical challenges we faced during software development and testing.

Phoenix was Arizona State University’s first student-led CubeSat to be launched into space in Feb. 2020. It’s objectives aimed to educate undergraduate students on the concepts of space mission engineering and to collect thermal images of U.S. cities to study the Urban Heat Island Effect.

Learn more about Phoenix at the project website: phxcubesat.asu.edu