The 120-kg experimental device X-SAT, which will cost about $10 million, is expected to be launched by 2007 and will be the first satellite designed and built entirely in Singapore.

Orbiting the earth every 90 minutes, X-SAT will observe the earth and collect and transmit data.

If it is a success, it may be used commercially and its data and pictures may be sold, NTU and DSO representatives said yesterday when they signed a memorandum of understanding.

In 1999, NTU scientists built the communications payload of the UoSAT-12 satellite launched in Kazakhstan the same year, making NTU the first educational institute here to put a satellite into space. The payload is the satellite's internal workings, which perform a variety of tasks.

The smallest satellite or nano-satellite usually weighs under 10 kg. Then comes the micro-satellite, and mini-satellite. A full-size satellite can weigh more than a tonne.

X-SAT, costing about $10 million, will be built by a core group of between 20 and 30 full-time staff at the new Centre for Research in Satellite Technologies (Crest), launched yesterday at the NTU campus. The partners will jointly develop micro-satellites and carry out research and development in satellite engineering.

Said DSO chief Quek Tong Boon: "X-SAT will enable Crest to boost its ability to develop a complete satellite and put it into orbit. The experience gained will give us the confidence to better define the specifications and successors to X-SAT."

Source: Singapore Press Holdings

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