In the past, the bright sky limited ground-based telescopes to nighttime-only operation, creating a gap in gathering and analyzing vital space data for military, civil and commercial interests. Now, Numerica has made a groundbreaking development in space object detection and tracking by developing and deploying the first fully functional, low-cost telescope systems that can observe Earth-orbiting satellites in broad daylight at altitudes of more than 36,000 kilometers (22,000 miles).

This patented technology is the result of several years of internal research and development efforts to meet the growing demand for daytime satellite observation given the increasingly congested and contested space environment.

Initial testing proved these systems to be capable of detecting objects from low Earth orbit (LEO) to geosynchronous orbit (GEO) both day and night. Numerica received a U.S. patent on Aug. 11, 2020, for detecting such space objects using shortwave infrared (SWIR) sensors during daytime hours without the use of cryogenic cooling components, a notable time and cost-saving alternative to existing approaches under development.

Daytime optical tracking represents a major innovation for the commercial space domain awareness market, increasing the observation opportunities on LEO satellites to GEO satellites and enabling the potential for a global network of low-cost telescopes to maintain custody of satellites through the current daylight coverage gap.

• World’s first ever daytime optical tracking service
• Demonstrated tracking of satellites from LEO to GEO at extreme solar elevations
• Data-as-a-service and sensor systems available commercially