6GStarLab -- A CubeSat Mission to support the development and standardization of Non-Terrestrial Networks towards 6G
Joan A. Ruiz-de-Azua, Francesc Betorz, Hossein Rouzegar, Joan F. Munoz-Martin, Marc Badia, Roger Jove, Adriano Camps, Diego Lopez-Pizarro, Jordi Barrera, Jorge-Nicolas Alvarez, Ieremia Crisan, Mohammad Danesh, Vivek Mangalam, Jan Smisek
TL;DR
The paper proposes 6GStarLab, an open in-orbit infrastructure to accelerate the development and standardization of Non-Terrestrial Networks for 6G. It details a $6U$ CubeSat platform by Open Cosmos, equipped with two Software Defined Radios (Minerva) and an optical terminal, all managed by a Flexible Payload software framework to allow on-demand, reconfigurable experiments across UHF, S-, X-, and Ka-bands plus laser links. The architecture emphasizes hardware modularity, virtualization, and a defined in-lab FlatSat verification process ahead of flight. A planned launch in Q2 2025 aims to provide the community with a flexible, affordable testbed to validate NTN concepts and contribute to 3GPP-standardization efforts. |“6GStarLab” thus stands to bridge gap between laboratory experiments and operational NTN deployments by enabling broad accessibility to a multi-band, software-defined, in-orbit laboratory.
Abstract
The emergence of the Non-Terrestrial Network (NTN) concept in the last years has revolutionized the space industry. This novel network architecture composed of aircraft and spacecraft is currently being standardized by the 3GPP. This standardization process follows dedicated phases in which experimentation of the technology is needed. Although some missions have been conducted to demonstrate specific and service-centric technologies, a open flexible in-orbit infrastructure is demanded to support this standardization process. This work presents the 6GStarLab mission, which aims to address this gap. Specifically, this mission envisions to provide a 6U CubeSat as the main in-orbit infrastructure in which multiple technology validations can be uploaded. The concept of this mission is depicted. Additionally, this work presents the details of the satellite platform and the payload. This last one is designed to enable the experimentation in multiple radio-frequency bands (i.e. UHF, S-, X-, and Ka-bands) and an optical terminal. The launch of the satellite is scheduled for Q2 2025, and it will contribute to the standardization of future NTN architectures.