ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Astron. Space Sci.
Sec. Astronomical Instrumentation
This article is part of the Research TopicAdvancements in Instrumentation and Technology for Astronomical Observations using Small Satellite and High-Altitude Balloon PlatformsView all articles
Near Ultraviolet Transient Explorer (NUTEx): A CubeSat-Based NUV Imaging Payload for Transient Sky Surveys
Provisionally accepted
Shubham Jankiram Ghatul1,2*
Rekhesh Mohan1*Jayant Murthy1
Margarita Safonova1Praveen Kumar1,3Maheswar Gopinathan1
Shubhangi Jain1,2Mahesh Babu1- 1Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA), Bangalore, India
- 2University of Calcutta, Kolkata, India
- 3Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru, India
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The Near Ultraviolet Transient Explorer (NUTEx) is a CubeSat-based near-ultraviolet (NUV) imaging payload designed for transient sky surveys and is currently under development. CubeSats are compact and cost-effective satellite platforms that have emerged as versatile tools for scientific exploration and technology demonstrations in space. NUTEx is an imaging telescope operating in the 200–300 nm wavelength range, intended for deployment on a micro-satellite bus. The optical system is based on a Ritchey–Chr´etien (RC) telescope configuration, featuring a 146-mm primary mirror. The detector is a photon-counting microchannel plate (MCP) device with a solar-blind photocathode, paired with an in-house-developed readout unit. The instrument has a wide field of view (FoV) of 4°, a peak effective area of approximately 18 cm² at 260 nm, and can reach a sensitivity of 21 AB magnitude (SNR = 5) in a 1200-second exposure. The primary scientific objective of NUTEx is to monitor the night sky for transient phenomena, such as supernova remnants, flaring M-dwarf stars, and other short-timescale events. The payload is currently scheduled for launch in Q2-2026. This paper presents the NUTEx instrument design, outlines its scientific goals and capabilities, and provides an overview of the electronics and mechanical subsystems, including structural analysis.
Keywords: CubeSats, Small Payloads, UV instrumentation, Imaging telescope, Payload structure, mechanical design
Received: 21 Jul 2025; Accepted: 26 Nov 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Ghatul, Mohan, Murthy, Safonova, Kumar, Gopinathan, Jain and Babu. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Shubham Jankiram Ghatul
Rekhesh Mohan
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