The National Aeronautics and Space Administration has agreed to launch a nanosatellite built by a group of Brown University students, ABC News reported.
NASA announced last week that EQUiSat is among 16 small satellites selected to fly on rockets to be launched over the three-year period beginning in 2015.
"It was pretty great to hear the news on Thursday," Hannah Varner, a senior engineering concentrator and one of the team's leaders, said in a statement. "We've all been in disbelief for the last few days."
The 4-inch miniature satellite is being built by about 25 students at the Ivy League school. The device is expected to launch within the next three years, ABC News reported.
The device uses a rechargeable power supply equivalent to a Kindle Fire tablet that will emit an array of 16 or so LED lights every two minutes. They will be bright enough to be seen at night by the naked eye. It will also send out brief radio signals.
"You'll be able to see it in the night sky and it'll be about as bright as the North Star so totally visible even in Providence," Emily Gilbert, fourth-year student and member of the team, told ABC News.
The student group hopes to develop a phone app that tells people where and when they can look for the satellite's flashes.
The satellite's built-in magnets will use Earth's magnetic field to keep the LED array pointing along the same latitude as Providence, where the light flashes will be brightest, The Providence Journal reported.
The device will weigh about 2 pounds and orbit at 185 to 250 miles above the earth.
"It started as a class project and just blossomed into something different all together," said graduate student Max Mann told ABC News.
Although the exact date of the launch has not been determined, it will be between 2015 and 2017, The Providence Journal reported.
The device is expected to be finished next year.
