IEEE - Aerospace and Electronic Systems - December 2023 - 35

Zapata et al.
Figure 12.
NDVI processed image with colorbar scale.
It is important to mention that the parachute is located
outside the CanSat structure, attached to it by a threaded
ring at the top of the lid. This avoids designing an ejection
mechanism for the parachute, which means that its
deployment during descent is done directly by the air
stream. This optimizes the weight, the availability ofspace
within the structure, and the energy consumption involved
in this mechanism.
The design ofthe parachute was performed by applying
the aerodynamic equation ofa parachute (1) included in the
European Space Agency's parachute design guide [6]
A ¼
mg
0:5cwrv2 :
(1)
According to the launch environmental conditions (Bog,
Col) the drag coefficient cw ¼ 1:1136, the air density r ¼
1:255 kg
the plant is. This allows a very first reference of the state
of vegetation of a particular place.
Additionally to obtain these types of images, the calibration
and contrast modification process mentioned in
the test section, allowed us to achieve valuable configurations
in which, regardless of the light conditions, results
consistent with our expectations could be achieved.
It is also noteworthy to add that the measurement of
environmental variables in the zone through sensors could
allow a deeper characterization of the vegetation in an
area of interest and of the variables that influence the
results of the images taken.
Finally, the importance of these technologies is
m3 and considering the landing speed v ¼ 5 m/s
and a mass of m ¼ 227g, the minimum area of the parachute
must be 0.1275 m2. This corresponds to a radius of
20:1cm and the radius used was 25cm, in order to
increase the surface area, which raises the drag force, and
reuse the parachute available. The parachute is illustrated
in Figure 11.
DISCUSSION
The most important achievement of this research was to
demonstrate that low-cost devices such as cameras, sensors,
and development boards can be used to obtainmeasurements
of environmental variables and also to perform photogrammetry
using vegetation indices. In addition to this, all of
these devices can be implemented in CanSat's missions.
With respect to the images taken, and as shown in
Figure 12, the color bar indicates the NDVI values which
are distributed between1 and 1 and give information
about the state of the vegetation, the closer to 1 the better
the condition of the vegetation. In terms of colors, most of
the gray-to-black colors represent dead vegetation, sky or
concrete buildings, and the warmer the color the healthier
DECEMBER 2023
highlighted, through which it is possible to reach a future
implementation in low-cost systems to obtain vegetation
information. It should be noted that this is not a direct
solution to the problems discussed in the article, but it is
still a valuable approach.
PROJECTION
It is expected that the participation of the Red Floyd team
in the CanSat Latin America 2021 challenge contributed
beyond the academic environment, inviting more people
of all levels of schooling to take part in these types of
events to develop experience and apply their knowledge.
On the other hand, improvements are proposed for the
design of the CanSat IRVI such as the optimization of its
system and operation and expanding its field of application;
these are further explained as:
1) It is planned to be applied to future projects within
the Aerospace Engineering and related fields, where
it will have a pragmatic and expanded approach to
the original one. For example, the development of
the launch vehicle as a rocket.
2) It is proposed to replace the prototype board model
with a printed circuit board (PCB) because it is
more effective, tidier, and takes up less space.
IEEE A&E SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
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