Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LNLL) was selected by the U.S. Department of Defense’s Defense Innovation Unit to provide a monolithic telescope for an orbital vehicle on a space mission to take place in 2027. LLNL will build and deliver the flight-ready payload, including two optical telescopes and an electronics module with a NVIDIA processor, within 13 months. The LLNL team also will support imaging operations throughout the on-orbit mission. Firefly Aerospace will host and operate the payload onboard its Elytra orbital vehicle during the mission in low Earth orbit (LEO), the area in space that ranges from about 60 to 1240 mi above the Earth. Rendering of Firefly’s Elytra Dawn vehicle utilizing LLNL’s telescope to perform space domain awareness operations. Courtesy of Firefly Aerospace. “This mission will prove a new capability for future highly maneuverable, responsive in-space imaging missions for the U.S. Defense Department in a variety of possible orbits including in deep space and into the lunar regime,” said Benjamin Bahney, LLNL’s space program leader. The mission supports the DIU’s Sinequone project that aims to deliver cost-effective, responsive access to space beyond geosynchronous orbits, referred to as xGEO. xGEO orbits are deep in space, a little more than 22,000 mi above the Earth, and are used for a variety of strategic and commercial missions. This mission in LEO is the first step to enable future responsive access and maneuverable Department of Defense capabilities in xGEO on responsive timelines. This will be LLNL’s third mission to develop rapid space payloads for the U.S. Defense Department, following on the successful Tactically Responsive Launch-2 (TacRL-2) mission in 2021 and the VICTUS HAZE mission launching as early as this year. LLNL’s monolithic optics are designed to be robust and highly adaptable for a range of optical payload configurations and missions.
