10/1/2025, NASA Kennedy Space Center, Florida

Working under agreement with NASA, partner agencies, and contractors, DSI assisted with alignment, electrical connections, and operational checks, enabling ATENEA’s insertion into the adapter ring for deployment.

ATENEA, developed by Argentina’s CONAE under a partnership with NASA, will measure radiation shielding effectiveness, map the Earth’s radiation spectrum, collect GPS data, and validate a long-range communications link. https://www.nasa.gov/blogs/missions/2025/05/20/nasa-signs-agreement-with-argentinas-space-agency-for-artemis-ii-cubesat/

The OSA, built and tested at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center, connects SLS’s interim cryogenic propulsion stage to the Orion spacecraft. It houses a composite diaphragm that protects Orion from launch gases and later enables deployment of CubeSats once Orion is safely distant.

DSI’s support carries mission significance. Artemis II is NASA’s first crewed mission of the Artemis program, sending astronauts on a lunar flyby and returning them safely to Earth. The CubeSat payloads aboard the OSA, including ATENEA, extend the mission’s scientific reach into radiation, communications, and navigation domains.

As the Artemis program progresses toward a sustained human return to the Moon, hardware like ATENEA, reliably integrated, plays a critical but often invisible role in enabling discovery and mission assurance!