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Breakthrough Starshot successfully launch world’s smallest spacecraft

by Futures Centre, Aug 3
1 minute read

Breakthrough Starshot successfully launch world’s smallest spacecraft

The smallest spacecraft ever launched are successfully travelling in low Earth orbit and communicating with systems on Earth, scientists have announced. Known as “Sprites”, the miniature satellites are just 3.5cm x 3.5cm and carry radios, sensors and computers, with each device powered by sunlight and weighing just four grams. While nanosatellites known as CubeSats have previously been sent into space, such systems have a mass thousands of times that of the Sprites, weighing more than 1kg.

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