# CubeSat Imaging Payload Design for Environmental Monitoring of Greenland
## 2 Materials and Methods
### System Design
The objective was to quantify the IPU's ability to handle diverse workloads efficiently and effectively. Moreover, benchmarking considers the system's responsiveness to varying levels of input data, providing insights into its scalability. Special attention was given to time-to-completion metrics, aligning with the stringent developing time requirements. Space limitations, hardware complexity, and power consumption are also factored in, ensuring a holistic assessment of the IPU's performance within the confines of the electronic system. We targeted the i-MX 6 and i.MX8 from NxP semiconductors, since they are powerful processors where power efficiency, computational performance, and space constraints are critical. The i.MX 6 offers robust processing power with lower energy consumption, suitable for basic ML tasks and satellite functions. In contrast, the i.MX 8 provides enhanced processing capabilities and NPU acceleration, enabling more complex ML algorithms and real-time data processing in orbit. As well as chip-only designs, we also identified System on Module (SOM) systems using the target processors. The SOM approach can remove the need for complex high-speed PCB design from the project, leaving the more manageable electronics design tasks of interface and power supply. SOMs based on the i-MX6 and i.MX8 are designed by several industrial device manufacturers. Therefore, we looked for the smallest SOMs that also have integrated with ML modules. As a result, we identified Toradex and PicoCore as manufacturers who develop industrial SOMs matching the above-established requirements. Those SOMs were selected for the integration step. Table 5 summarizes the IPU benchmarking. \begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{c c c c c c c c} \hline \hline \multirow{3}{*}{**Requirement**} & \multicolumn{1}{c}{\multirow{3}{*}{**U3-3990 SE-C-**}} & \multicolumn{5}{c}{**Camera Providers**} \\ \cline{2-9}  & & \begin{tabular}{c} **U3-3110 CP-C-** \\ **HQ** \\ \end{tabular} & \begin{tabular}{c} **U3-311L5E-C-** \\ **HQ** \\ \end{tabular} & \begin{tabular}{c} **U3-311L5E-C-** \\ **HQ** \\ \end{tabular} & \begin{tabular}{c} **mvBlue FOX3** \\ **2051 aC** \\ \end{tabular} & \begin{tabular}{c} **Alvium 1800** \\ **U-2040** \\ \end{tabular} & \begin{tabular}{c} **Alvium 1800** \\ **U-1620** \\ \end{tabular} & \begin{tabular}{c} **Alvium 1800** \\ **U-1242** \\ \end{tabular} \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular} \begin{tabular}{c c c c c c c c} \hline \hline \multirow{2}{*}{Recam\_9} & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular} \begin{tabular}{c c c c c c c} \hline \hline \multirow{2}{*}{Recam\_10} & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular} \begin{tabular}{c c c c c c c} \hline \hline \multirow{2}{*}{Recam\_11} & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular} \begin{tabular}{c c c c c c c} \hline \hline \multirow{2}{*}{Recam\_13} & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular} \
\begin{tabular}{c c c c c c c} \hline \hline \multirow{2}{*}{Recam\_14} & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular}
\begin{tabular}{c c c c c c c} \hline \hline \multirow{2}{*}{Recam\_16} & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) & \(\checkmark\) \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular}
\end{table} 
Table 4: Cameras’ model benchmarking. Fully covered: \(\checkmark\), partially covered: \(\bullet\).