Professor Martin Sweeting, inventor of microsatellites
The Life Scientific
BBC
4.6 • 1.4K Ratings
🗓️ 20 April 2021
⏱️ 30 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
When Martin Sweeting was a student, he thought it would be fun to try to build a satellite using electronic components found in some of the earliest personal computers. An amateur radio ham and space enthusiast, he wanted to create a communications satellite that could be used to talk to people on the other side of the world. It was a team effort, he insists, with friends and family pitching in and a lot of the work being done on his kitchen table. Somehow he managed to persuade Nasa to let his microsatellite hitch a ride into space and, after the first message was received, spent more than a decade trying to get a good picture of planet earth. The technology that Martin pioneered underpins modern life with thousands of reprogrammable microsatellites now in orbit around the earth and thousands more due to launch in the next few years to bring internet connections to remote parts of the world. The university spin-off company, Surrey Satellite Technologies Limited (SSTL) that Martin set up in the 1980s with an initial investment of £100 sold for £50 million a quarter of a century later. If his company had been bought by venture capitalists, he says he would probably have ended up making TVs. Instead he developed the satellite technology on which so much of modern life depends.
Producer: Anna Buckley
Photo Credit: SSTL
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Before you listen to this BBC podcast, I'd like to introduce myself. |
| 0:03.7 | My name's Stevie Middleton and I'm a BBC Commissioner for a load of sport podcasts. |
| 0:08.4 | I'm lucky to do that at the BBC because I get to work with a leading journalist, experienced |
| 0:12.2 | pundits and the biggest sport stars. |
| 0:14.3 | Together we bring you untold stories and fascinating insights straight from the players' |
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| 0:19.5 | But the best thing about doing this at the BBC is our unique access to the sport world. |
| 0:25.0 | What that means is that we can bring you podcasts that create a real connection to |
| 0:28.8 | dedicated sports fans across the UK. |
| 0:31.5 | So if you like this podcast, head over to BBC Sounds where you'll find plenty more. |
| 0:35.8 | Hello, I'm Jim Arkelele and this is the Life Scientific. |
| 0:39.8 | The deal is I get to talk to some of the amazing men and women who are trying to understand |
| 0:44.4 | our world and to make it a better place. |
| 0:47.3 | And you get to find out what makes them get out of bed in the morning. |
| 0:50.6 | My guest today is a science fiction fan who made his sci-fi dream come true. |
| 0:56.7 | As a boy, Martin Sweeting dreamed about getting into space. |
| 1:00.8 | As a young researcher, he designed his own satellite and built it from scratch from electronic |
| 1:05.6 | components found in the then-new personal computers. |
| 1:09.3 | Then against all the odds, he persuaded NASA to let his DIY, but fairly modern satellite, |
| 1:15.7 | hitch a ride on one of their Delta rockets. |
| 1:18.5 | In the mid-80s, he set up Surrey Satellite Technologies, a spin-off company largely owned |
| 1:23.2 | by the University of Surrey, where he worked, to design and build his micro-satellites. |
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