Overview
- Under a scenario of roughly 560,000 low‑Earth‑orbit satellites, the study estimates about 40% of Hubble images and about 96% of SPHEREx, ARRAKIHS and Xuntian images would be tainted by reflected or emitted light.
- Simulations forecast average streaks per exposure of 2.14 for Hubble, 5.64 for SPHEREx, 69 for ARRAKIHS and 92 for Xuntian, reflecting each mission’s altitude, field of view and exposure strategy.
- The methodology is partly validated by present conditions, reproducing analyses that roughly 4% of recent Hubble frames already contain satellite trails.
- ARRAKIHS project scientists dispute the paper’s high-impact estimate for their telescope, arguing final design orientation and observing plans should cut contamination to around 1%.
- Proposed responses include lower operating altitudes for satellites, darker or less reflective designs and sharing precise ephemerides and reflectance data, with experts noting actual constellation sizes could be lower than filings and missions at Sun–Earth L2 such as JWST and Roman are effectively immune.