The first satellite built at Germany's Technical University of Berlin was intended primarily to test attitude control subsystems and give students practice in the design, construction and operation of a satellite. Tubsat-A was launched piggyback with the first ERS mission, and because of it's near polar orbit, the spacecraft became an important communications tool for arctic and Antarctic expeditions. The spacecraft also acted as a testbed for some industry technology including GaAs cells and a transputer. Payload: Star Sensor, Sun Sensor, 3-Axis Magnetic Field Sensor, Magnetorquer, Store & Forward Communication.

Total Length: 0.4 m. Maximum Diameter: 0.4 m. Total Mass: 38 kg.

Store and forward communication.

• 2 - McDowell, Jonathan, The United Nations Registry of Space Objects, Harvard University, 1997. HTML when accessed: http://hea-www.harvard.edu/QEDT/jcm/space/un/un.html
• 6 - JPL Mission and Spacecraft Library, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, 1997. HTML when accessed: http://msl.jpl.nasa.gov/home.html
• 279 - McDowell, Jonathan, Launch Log, October 1998. HTML when accessed: http://hea-www.harvard.edu/~jcm/space/log/launch.html