DIY Space: Citizens in Space

Posted on by John Holst
Image hosted on Citizensinspace.org.

Are you a citizen scientist with a satellite payload idea?  Then this might be the program for you:  Citizens in Space.

Citizens in Space would like you to develop an actual experiment, one in which you’ll be surprised by the outcome, no matter what the outcome is.  They’d like you to keep the payload experiment within the physical limits of a cubesat (or two).  The contest is forward-looking in that the size limits will help make the cubesats “swappable” among launch service providers.

They’re also looking for someone to conduct these payload experiments during flight.  Yes, that’s right, you could also be a citizen astronaut.  They’ve already chosen three citizen astronaut candidates, but are looking for seven more.  They’d like to have selected all citizen astronaut candidates in the next year or two.

Top prize for an experiment will be $10,000.  It looks like they wanted the experimental hardware completed in 2013, but there is no apparent real deadline just yet.  You can find those details, or lack thereof, here.  The ambiguity of the timeline for this contest may be because XCOR Aerospace is still not completed with their sub-orbital Lynx (model pictured above), just yet.  And XCOR is the company Citizens in Space contracted with to get some of these experimental payloads up into space–if only for a few minutes.

If you need some inspiration, they do have a page full of payload experiment ideas, here.  It might be worth your while, if they’re still taking experiments for the contest.  Or, take a shot at being a citizen astronaut.

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Published by John Holst

Ill-Defined Space is written by me, John Holst. ​If you’ve ever asked the following question, “What is this commercial space industry thing?” then welcome to my world. I will never have the answer to that question, but I do offer insights based on my industry experience and observations. I’ve tried defining, decrypting, deciphering, analyzing, and then translating the endless stream of the world’s space industry activities, policies, and press releases. I’ve experienced varying degrees of success in my attempts to do so. The upshot is that if you want thoughtful, occasionally useful, observations about the world’s space industry, then you may want to read my analyses. Boring, but potentially credibility-building information follows: I have a Master’s in Commercial Enterprise in Space through the Florida Institute of Technology. I was an undergrad at the University of Washington in Seattle, graduating from there with a degree in Journalism. My analysis of the space industry has been a definitive source for national lawmakers and departments, news outlets such as the Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, Bloomberg, and the San Francisco Chronicle, publications like National Geographic, and National Public Radio. It’s been published in The Space Report: The Authoritative Guide to Global Space Activity from 2014-2023 (here’s a link to a 1Q19 promo copy). You can also see my work in Quilty Analytic’s series of LEO Broadband Reports. ​ I’ve worked in the United States Air Force, Missile Defense Agency, Cobham, Space Dynamics Laboratory, the Space Foundation, and Quilty Analytics. I focused on space operations in the first few and conducted space industry research and analysis with the last two.