Japan Sends the World's 1st Wooden Satellite to Space! LignoSat to Prove Wood is a Sustainable Space Material

On this week's episode, Alex dives into Japan's Lignosat mission from JAXA!

• LignoSat is a wooden CubeSat launched from the International Space Station on December 13, 2024.
• LignoSat aims to test wood as a sustainable, thermally insulating alternative to traditional space materials like aluminum and titanium.
• Previous research by Kyoto University showed wood's resilience to space conditions over 10 months.
• The mission could reduce orbital debris and environmental impacts of re-entry. 

We also recognize the major job changes in the space industry since the start of the year and invite space professionals to network here on Today In Space! Email us at [e-mail] if you're interested in sharing your Space Industry story and promote what you're working on next in an episode of People of Science. Here to give you a voice and to share your experience to an awesome space community!

Sources:

https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2313374120
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2024/nov/05/worlds-first-wooden-satellite-launched-into-space
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c5y3qzd5ql9o
https://www.space.com/space-exploration/launches-spacecraft/watch-spacex-launch-3-tons-of-cargo-to-iss-today
https://youtu.be/u1NJmz5m7zY?si=V7BXQ_OdYhRaDmC9

https://digital.wpi.edu/concern/student_works/xp68kh975?locale=en

Keywords:

wooden CubeSat, space material, thermal insulation, sustainably sourced, orbital debris, re-entry safety, space industry changes, job opportunities, material science, environmental impact, space exploration, CubeSat project, space research, wood properties, space innovation

Timestamps:

00:00 Lignosat Mission Overview
01:42 Background and Launch Details
02:26 Space Industry Job Transitions 
03:26 Why Wood is a Great Space Material
05:54 Environmental Benefits of Wood in Space
10:15 Challenges and Future Prospects
11:30 NEW 3D Printing Blog is up from AG3D! 

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 Alex G. Orphanos

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#spacecraft #technology #aerospace #spacetechnology #engineer #stem #artemis #astronaut #spacewalk #crewdragon #falcon9 #elonmusk #starship #superheavybooster #blueorigin #newglenn #rocket #jaredisaacman #nasahistory #spaceshuttle #lignosat #woodinspace #iamgroot #jaxa

 

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Alex, hello and welcome to TodayIn Space the All Things Space

(00:05):
Science Podcast, where weexplore the latest and most
intriguing developments in spaceexploration. I'm your space
science podcast host from theEast Coast. Alex giorfanos, now
mission most of February herewith flu or whatever the hell I
caught. But space progresscontinued, and we stayed
watching. One of the mostinteresting and unique missions

(00:26):
to follow along with was Jacksays, All wooded CubeSat,
lignosat. Now, what is Japan'sspace agency doing sending a
wooden satellite into space fromthe International Space Station?
Why is wood a great spacematerial, apparently, and could
wood be better for theenvironment than metal, and what

(00:49):
applications for space travel?Can wood help with in the
future? No more questions. Let'sdive in.
To start, let's get down tobasics. What is the lignosat
mission? Well, jax's lignosat isa wooden CubeSat, or a micro

(01:11):
satellite smaller than yourhead, that can easily be
packaged and launched. Theybecome commonplace in today's
world, and I actually worked ona CubeSat project when I was in
college. They are a great way tolearn and access space. They can
either be launched from rocketsor from the Peapod unit on the
ISS, which I think is the nameof it still, but that's what it

(01:34):
was back when I was doing myresearch project. But it's
basically a springboard launcherthat sends these out into space.
That's exactly what happenedwith Kyoto University's lignosat
On December 13, 2024 when it wasdeployed with two other
satellites. The mission intendsto showcase wood in the
harshness of space as astructural replacement for metal

(01:57):
structures typically used forthings like this. And this
mission is actually acontinuation of research done on
the space station by KyotoUniversity. Various wood samples
were tested and exposed to spacefor 10 months to see how it
reacted to radiation, the vacuumof space, extreme heat, cold and
more wood performed so well thatKyoto University continued their

(02:21):
research and built a CubeSat.Let's pause for a quick break
here before we get to sectiontwo to acknowledge the fact that
there is a lot of change in theair in the space industry right
now. Between NASA and BlueOrigin, there are a lot of
people without jobs at themoment, moment or between jobs,

(02:41):
and that's not to mention plentyof other companies, big
manufacturers of aerospace, thathave made cuts in the last month
since the start of the year. Ifyou're a space professional,
you're listening to thispodcast, we like to offer to
come on the podcast to talkabout your stem origin story,
what it was like working forthose companies, and what you're
looking to do next. Our door isopen. Introduce yourself to the

(03:06):
Today In Space network and tothe internet. It's a great way
to put yourself out there,especially if you're on the
resume, job searching, hunt.Email us at Today In Space
[e-mail] we would loveto make a connection with you
and to help promote what you'redoing and just the awesomeness
that you're you've worked in thespace industry. People want to
hear about that. If you want toget your story out there and get

(03:27):
a great digital interview foryour resume or to promote
whatever you're up to next, hitus up. Great change can turn
into great things, and we'd loveto help you in this dark time,
promote yourself and get thegreat work you do out there. So
email us Today In [e-mail] and let us
know if you want to come on thepodcast and talk about all

(03:48):
things space. Now let's get backto the episode. Why wood makes a
great space material. So whatdid they find from their
research on the station thatgave them the confidence to move
forward with building a CubeSatto launch into space. Well, wood
has surprisingly uniqueproperties for space and has
natural thermal insulationproperties. Has a great strength

(04:11):
to weight ratio and can besustainably sourced. Most wonder
materials like aluminum andtitanium are great strength to
weight ratios, but they arecertainly not sustainable
materials, not to mention theydo not have great thermal
insulation properties, whichrequires more mass added to the

(04:32):
space object and complexitymanaging the thermal
fluctuations in a CubeSat. Iknow one of the revelations of
working on a CubeSat project wasthe hot or the in light and
shadow side of a small 3u cubesat, which would be three of
these ligno stats stacked upagainst each other, the flex and

(04:54):
the thermal distortion thatwould happen because one side,
you know, space, the vacuum. Youhave one side getting all of the
sun's energy and heating up veryhot, the backside being in a
vacuum, completely cold, withoutany light. So you have these
extreme temperatures on eitherside of the spacecraft. And you

(05:14):
have to account for all of that,otherwise, your spacecraft isn't
going to last long and couldactually start tumbling out of
control. I mean, that's part ofwhat makes these asteroids and
comets change their orbit overtime, is their effect against
the sun, right? The same thingcan happen on a CubeSat. I just
thought that was fascinating. Itwas not obvious before I learned

(05:38):
it. So anyways, if wood can beused in a way that can help
reduce that just by its naturalproperties, I mean that's that's
material science of gold, andwould be a welcome addition to a
spacecraft. Another aspect thatmakes wood a great space
material is with orbital debrisand environmental impacts of re

(06:00):
entry, one of the majordownsides of these wonder
materials is that they have avery high melting temperature.
This means that re entering theatmosphere doesn't guarantee
that all the debris actuallyburns up. And there have been
enough orbital debris incidentsof space junk going through
people's ceilings to make it aproblem worth solving. Wood

(06:22):
would allow a spacecraft thestrength and durability to get
to space, survive theenvironment of space, and then
also fully burn up in theatmosphere, reducing the chance
that anyone could be impacted onthe ground or whatever it's
doing to our atmosphere. Woodfor safer re entry and reduced
orbital debris. Orbital Debrishas been a risk, continues to be

(06:45):
a risk, and will become more ofa risk with more and more things
going into space, that's justthe reality of the world we're
in. We've seen InternationalSpace Station batteries from
NASA go through someone'sceiling defunct satellite like
Starlink and others de orbit ona regular basis because they're

(07:06):
not functioning anymore. Maybesolar flare took them out.
Something happened on launch. Ithappened so they they send them
back into the atmosphere.Starship had its orbital debris
issue on this last test flight,and that's not to mention China,
just free falling launch debrisover their people after a
launch. There's a real need tochange and to get some

(07:26):
innovation here, because it'sgoing to get out of control if
we don't focus on it. We talkedabout some of the reasons wood
could make a good material inthe harshness of space, and it
seems that it could also bebetter for our own atmosphere.
So the satellite and spacecraftof today that are re entering
the atmosphere are built withrobust metals and composites. It

(07:47):
makes sense you need that to getto space. But aside from the
atmospheric release of chemicalsfrom these items, not even just
the metal, but everything, allthe wire electronics burning up
in the atmosphere, there's alsothe concern of metallic dust
from these robust materials thatcan litter the upper atmosphere

(08:08):
with no slowing down of launchesor orbital debris. In the
future, the momentum is clearlygoing to get more and more. That
means there's going to be moreand more metallic dust in the
upper atmosphere. And accordingto some research, it's not taken
seriously, the more progress inspace would mean less progress
for the climate. So what do wedo? Do we just stop going to

(08:28):
space? Or do we look deeper fornew ideas and solutions we never
had the motivation to look forbefore? That's what the Kyoto
University and Japanese woodprocessing company, Sumitomo
forestry team were thinkingfirst as a huge space geek
myself, this is fuckingincredible. Space materials are

(08:51):
so expensive, which then makesgoing to space expensive part of
the expenses meeting theserobust and exotic alloys to get
machine casted or formed intothe shapes that they need to be
for these structures. But theydon't play nice with tools, the
environment or the machinestrying to change them. But they
work machining titanium, forexample, which is rarer because

(09:15):
it's so expensive, but it'sdangerous and difficult cutters
break. It can catch fire, it'sreactive, not to mention
aluminum, which is much cheaper,but it's not that much easier to
work either. But if a nation orcompany could grow its own space
materials and have a shot atsustainability at the same time,

(09:38):
that would be revolutionary. Solet's break it down. Not only
could wood in space applicationsreduce the cost of space
materials in a sustainable way,but its properties have already
shown promise that it's ruggedagainst the harshness of the
environment of space. And thenon top of it, it could also
potentially reduce the.Environmental effects of

(10:01):
increased orbital activity onEarth by replacing metal.
This mission doesn't get thelove that it deserves, but we're
spreading the word, because inanother four or so months, the
lignosat mission will finish upafter the CubeSat is tugged back
into the atmosphere by gravityfor a burn up on re entry. If

(10:22):
lignosat survives throughout itsmission and gathers good data,
then we might see more ecofriendly space materials out
there, sciencing the shit out ofthe environmental impacts that
space travel can have. But also,it's amazing that we didn't
think of wood in space sooner. Imean, Groot is a space wood

(10:42):
alien. The writing was on thewall the whole time. But we're
just really glad that thismission, lignosat is happening.
We love cube sats I mean, that'swhat got me into space. It was
literally we were working on acube satellite for solar
weather. And I wish everyaerospace engineer had the
opportunity to work on a CubeSatfor us. We actually never got to

(11:05):
launch a mission to space. Sothe Kyoto University team is
crushing it, and I love to seethat partnership of the forestry
team and the University studentstrying to take this material
science approach. So very coolmission. We love seeing it, and
it'll be interesting to see whatthis Magnolia wood like is such

(11:27):
a special kind of wood, was it?Is it only grown in Japan? And I
definitely want to dig more intoall the individual types of wood
that they chose and how theyeach handled space environment,
but we love to know what youthink this is Today In Space.
Follow us along online. Today InSpace on Tiktok, Today In Space

(11:50):
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Live, let us know what you thinkabout that. And if you're

(12:12):
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AG, 3d printing, we're doing aton of new stuff. We just put
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(12:33):
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(12:53):
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