Newest Small Satellite by the University of Technology

The latest small satellite of the Budapest University of Technology and Economics (BME), the MRC-100, which will study electro smog around the Earth, has been completed. The spacecraft is scheduled to be launched into space in May 2023.

The small satellite was built over three years in collaboration with teachers, researchers and students from the BME Department of Broadband Communications and Electricity. It is named in honor of the BMU Radio Club, which will be 100 years old in 2024. MRC-100 is the largest satellite in the SMOG series, measuring 5x5x15 centimeters, according to the BME website.

In addition to the sub-units that ensure the operation of the new spacecraft and the equipment for the electrosmog analysis, the new spacecraft also has a position stabilization system. It will carry measuring instruments into space, in addition to autonomous experiments carried out at three universities (University of Szeged, Széchenyi István University Győr, University of Debrecen).

The launch costs are covered by the US Amateur Radio Digital Communications Foundation. The most important Hungarian sponsors of the project are the National Media and Infocommunications Authority and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

According to the BME, as the satellite is due to be handed over to the space launch company six months before its launch in May 2023, the MRC-100 satellite will be on its way to the Scottish city of Glasgow in the next few days to be installed on the satellite platform. The satellite will be carried into space by Elon Musk's Falcon-9 rocket from the United States. The MRC-100 is the fifth satellite to be developed at BME in the SMOG project, which was launched in 2013. As part of the project, the SMOG-P pocket satellite was launched in December 2019 and completed its mission at the end of September 2020. Its measurements were used to produce the first electromagnetic pollution map showing the electromagnetic impact of digital terrestrial TV broadcasting.