November 20, 2023
THE VARSITY The University of Toronto’s Student Newspaper Since 1880
Vol. CXLIV, No. 10
Liftoff: HERON Mk. II reaches orbit U of T Aerospace Team describes their path to launching the first fully student-funded Canadian satellite Rosalind Liang & Benjamin Nero Varsity Contributors
On November 11 at 1:49 pm EST, we watched with bated breath as the University of Toronto Aerospace Team (UTAT) Space Systems’ HERON Mk. II satellite lifted off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California, aboard a Falcon 9 rocket of the SpaceX Transporter-9 mission. As a rideshare mission to space, the Transporter-9 delivered HERON Mk. II — alongside 89 other small satellites — to an orbit approximately 540 kilometres above Earth’s surface. Marking the culmination of nearly a decade of work by our fellow student Space Systems engineers, the HERON Mk. II’s path to the launch pad was one of dedication and perseverance.
Letter from the Editors: How we’re covering violence in Gaza and Israel
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News: UTM and UTSC students hold walkouts for Palestine
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About the team In brief, we at the UTAT are a team composed primarily of engineering students that designs and builds small satellites known as CubeSats. By small, we mean that they are no larger than a loaf of bread and only weigh a few kilograms! Formed in 2014 by a group of undergraduate students, our team is open to satellite enthusiasts of all backgrounds, from precocious high schoolers to graduate students eager to share expertise. For many of us, UTAT Space Systems has become an integral part of university life, seeding many fruitful careers and friendships. Having been active on the team for several years, the two of us can certainly attest to the value it has added to our undergraduate studies. We are both members of the team: Benjamin Nero, the current Mission Manager of HERON Mk. II, and Rosalind Liang, 2022–2023 Director of UTAT Space Systems. But enough about us. We’re here to tell you about the story of HERON Mk. II.
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Comment: International crises shouldn’t have to compete for our attention
Where it all began In the early days, long before we came around, the Space Systems team was small but motivated by a common vision of sending a satellite into space one day. Our team’s first satellite, HERON Mk. I — short for Human Experiment Relay On Nanosatellite — was a CubeSat developed from 2014–2016. The team designed it for the third edition of the Canadian Satellite Design Challenge (CDSC), a competition in which university students across Canada are invited to design, build, and test their own CubeSats. The main scientific or technological unit on board a satellite is known as its payload. HERON Mk. I housed a payload platform that measures how low Earth orbit (LEO) would affect gene expression and drug resistance of Candida albicans — a potentially harmful yeast strain commonly found in the human gut microbiome. Results of previous studies suggested that C. albicans might display increased resistance to drugs in response to such an environment, which might potentially have negative implications for long-term spaceflight. For various reasons, the third CDSC did not end in a launch opportunity for the team, and so HERON Mk. I was retired. Armed with valuable lessons, the UTAT soon began work on the second iteration of our spacecraft, HERON Mk. II, for the fourth CSDC running from 2016–2018. At its inception, HERON Mk. II housed the same C. albicans payload as its predecessor. Continued on page 15
HERON Mk. II Flight Model (2021)