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Getting to know Clustergate-2

Clustergate-2 is our second mission, designed to provide a cloud-like computing environment in space. It enables engineers and developers to easily deploy and run their software applications beyond Earth.

Clustergate-2 offers a flexible and powerful combination of software and hardware options, including:

  • An Arm Cortex-A53 microprocessor
  • A Jetson Orin Nano NX
  • An UltraScale+ Xilinx FPGA

Developers have the freedom to choose how and where to deploy their applications, depending on their specific requirements.

In addition to compute resources, Clustergate-2 provides a rich variety of telemetry data for onboard processing. This includes everything from orbital and satellite health data to wide-angle camera images and LiDAR sensor readings. These resources open the door to a wide range of possible applications. For detailed information, please refer to the Telemetry section.

Software payloads are deployed using Docker containers, making it easy to bring existing applications onboard. Next section will briefly explain Docker containers. Workloads are automatically scheduled using Kubernetes, which optimizes performance and enables condition-based triggers—such as orbital position or satellite orientation. For example, developers can configure their containers to run when Clustergate-2 is flying over Uruguay, during an eclipse, or when the satellite is pointing directly downward (nadir).

The system handles all the complexity behind the scenes, allowing developers to focus on building their applications rather than managing deployment logistics. For a quick introduction on Docker Containers, check out the Docker Best Practices in Space section.