Quantify the energy damping in multi-particle systems at low collision speeds (The main objective of Q-PACE is to understand protoplanetary growth from pebbles to boulders by performing long-duration microgravity collision experiments. As of March 2021, however, contact has yet to be established with the satellite, and the mission is feared to be lost. On 17 January 2021, Q-PACE launched on a Virgin Orbit Launcher One, an air launch to orbit rocket that was dropped from the Cosmic Girl airplane over the Pacific Ocean. The small spacecraft does not need accurate pointing or propulsion, which simplified the design. Several precursor tests and flight missions were performed in suborbital flights as well as in the International Space Station. Q-PACE will explore the fundamental properties of low‐velocity (< 10 cm/s (3.9 in/s)) particle collisions in a microgravity environment in an effort to better understand accretion in the protoplanetary disk. The current hypotheses of planetesimal formation have difficulties in explaining how particles grow beyond one centimeter in size, so repeated experimentation in relevant conditions is necessary. Observations of the collisional evolution and accretion of particles in a microgravity environment are necessary to elucidate the processes that lead to the formation of planetesimals (the building blocks of planets), km-size, and larger bodies, within the protoplanetary disk. The development of the mission was funded through NASA's Small Innovative Missions for Planetary Exploration (SIMPLEx) program.
Q-PACE is led by Joshua Colwell at the University of Central Florida and was selected NASA's CubeSat Launch Initiative (CSLI) which placed it on Educational Launch of Nanosatellites ELaNa XX. Artist's impression of a protoplanetary disk
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