Experimental Electric Power System for Small Satellites with Independent Supply Channels

Small satellites such as CubeSats are not adequately protected in the cosmic environment from ionizing radiation due to the low weight limit, which does not allow the use of heavy shielding materials with the high atomic number. Therefore, the power supply system of such small satellites must be protected from radiation induced failures in the satellite electronic subsystems. The power supply system must also provide a reliable power supply in the event of a fault in its own components. This requires more independent power supply channels for satellite subsystems and reliable protection circuits. In this paper, we propose an electric power system with three independent channels and necessary protection circuits for the PilsenCube II satellite. Two supply channels use Li-Ion accumulators and unregulated bus. The third supply channel uses supercapacitors and regulated bus. The three independent supply channels are complemented by the overcurrent protection circuits in each subsystem board that allow controlled post-fault regeneration.