The RAPTORS Spacejunk Hunting project is an undergraduate built telescope system that focuses on detecting spacejunk and satellites that orbit Earth. These two twenty-four-inch telescopes hunt both in the day and in the night for the material that most closely orbits Earth. In some cases, this debris that entangles the space just above Earth's atmosphere is toxic and potentially dangerous to space travelers and Earthlings alike.
Undergraduate engineer students from left to right: Lindsie Jefferies (Biomedical Engineering and Mathematics), Damon Marco Colpo (Optical Sciences and Mathematics), Sameep Arora (Mechanical Engineering), Evelyn Hunten (Electrical and Computer Engineering) and Ryan Bronson (Optical Sciences and Mathematics).
The undergraduate engineer students constructed RAPTORS for their Senior Thesis project in 2016-2017. The students were able to build this size telescope at a fraction of a cost.