The was a Japanese space agency, which was founded by the

Ministry of International Trade and Industry The was a ministry of the Government of Japan from 1949 to 2001. The MITI was one of the most powerful government agencies in Japan and, at the height of its influence, effectively ran much of Japanese industrial policy, funding research and d ...

in 1986. Unlike

NASDA The , or NASDA, was a Japanese national space agency established on October 1, 1969 under the National Space Development Agency Law only for peaceful purposes. Based on the Space Development Program enacted by the Minister of Education, Culture, ...

, ISAS, and

NAL NAL or Nal may refer to: In organizations: * Nal Sarovar Bird Sanctuary, in India * National Aerospace Laboratories, India * National Aerospace Laboratory of Japan * National Alliance of Liberals, a political party in Ghana * United States Nat ...

, it was not included in the JAXA organization, which was founded in 2003. The chairperson is Ichiro Taniguchi. In 2012, USEF merged two other organizations— Earth Remote Sensing Data Analysis Center (ERSDAC) and Japan Resources Observation System Organization (JAROS)—to form a new organization Japan Space Systems (J-spacesystems).

Goal

The aim of USEF is technology development, especially the testing of commercial off-the-shelf parts ( COTS), robotics, material sciences and technology for optical earth observations.

Launch vehicle

Unlike the JAXA organisation, USEF doesn't have its own launch vehicle. Instead, it has used either the

H-IIA H-IIA (H-2A) is an active expendable launch system operated by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) for the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency. These liquid fuel rockets have been used to launch satellites into geostationary orbit; lunar o ...

, the M-3S, or Russian rockets, so far. However, in 2008, METI mentioned the possibility of USEF developing an air-launched vehicle for small payloads.

Completed missions

EXPRESS

The Experiment Re-entry Space System (EXPRESS) was a 745 kg (1,642 lb) satellite for microgravity experiments and testing of re-entry technologies. The project was done in cooperation with ISAS (now JAXA) and DLR of Germany. On January 15, 1995, it was launched on the M-3S. However, due to a problem with the rocket, the orbit was much lower than planned. The re-entry capsule was found later in

Ghana Ghana (; tw, Gaana, ee, Gana), officially the Republic of Ghana, is a country in West Africa. It abuts the Gulf of Guinea and the Atlantic Ocean to the south, sharing borders with Ivory Coast in the west, Burkina Faso in the north, and To ...

SERVIS 1

The SERVIS-1 is an 840 kg (1,851 lb) technology test mission with COTS parts. It was launched on October 30, 2001, with the Russian

Rockot Rokot (russian: Рокот meaning ''Rumble'' or ''Boom''), also transliterated Rockot, was a Russian space launch vehicle that was capable of launching a payload of into a Earth orbit with 63° inclination. It was based on the UR-100N (SS-1 ...

launch vehicle. the mission duration was two years.

USERS

Unmanned Space Experiment Recovery System (USERS) was launched on the

on September 10, 2002. The aim of the mission was microgravity experiments to perform the Super-Conductor Material Processing Experiment and also testing of satellite bus technologies. For the first part of the mission, USERS carried a return capsule. It was retrieved successfully on May 29, 2003. The mission of the main orbiter ended during re-entry in 2007.

SERVIS 2

SERVIS-2 was a 900 kg (1,984 lb) technology test mission with COTS parts. It will continue the experiments done with the first SERVIS satellite. It was launched on June 2, 2010, 01:59 UTC, with the Russian Rockot launch vehicle.

ASNARO missions

ASNARO 1

ASNARO-1, the first of "Advanced Satellite with New system Architecture Observation" series, is a 450 kg (992 lb) earth observation satellite. The expected resolution is less than 0.5 meter (1.6 ft) from an SSO orbit. The satellite was launched on 2014 Nov 6 by a Dnepr rocket from Yasniy, Russia.

ASNARO 2

ASNARO 2 is small X-band radar satellite for Earth observation. The satellite was launched on 17 January 2018 by an Epsilon rocket.

Other technology projects

USEF developed the robotic arm of the

ETS-VII The ETS-VII, or Engineering Test Satellite No. 7, was a satellite developed and launched by the National Space Development Agency of Japan (NASDA). It is also known as KIKU-7. It was launched aboard an H-II rocket from Tanegashima Space Center, o ...

project to test docking technology in the 1990s. Demonstration of Green Propellant reaction control system (GPRCS) was originally under development for SERVIS-3 project. Eventually it was launched and demonstrated successfully aboard

RAPIS-1 RAPIS-1 (RAPid Innovative payload demonstration Satellite 1) is a satellite launched on 18 January 2019 which for over a year was used to test seven technology demonstration projects. RAPIS-1 was developed and operated by Axelspace Corporation, u ...

in 2019. Hyperspectral Imager Suite (HISUI) was launched aboard

SpaceX CRS-19 SpaceX CRS-19, also known as SpX-19, was a Commercial Resupply Service mission to the International Space Station. The mission is contracted by NASA and was flown by SpaceX on a Falcon 9 rocket. Dragon capsule C106 made its third flight on CR ...

on 5 December 2019 to the

International Space Station The International Space Station (ISS) is the largest modular space station currently in low Earth orbit. It is a multinational collaborative project involving five participating space agencies: NASA (United States), Roscosmos (Russia), JAXA ( ...

and installed at the External Facility of the Japanese Experiment Module ''Kibo''.

References

External links

* {{Public sector space agencies Space program of Japan Space agencies