Wide Eye Debris telescope allows to catalogue objects in any orbital zone

CGS SpA Compagnia Generale per lo Spazio formerly Carlo Gavazzi Space SpA, INAF (Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica), DM (Dipartimento di Matematica Pisa) and ISTI-CNR (Istituto di Scienza e Tecnologie dell'Informazione), all members of an Italian Team studying Space Surveillance topics, have been awarded by ESA a Feasibility Study of an innovative optical system for debris surveillance obtained by applying a good combi- nation of both innovative and state of the art solutions. This paper presents the architecture of the optical sensor used for space debris monitoring, catalogue build up and maintenance for collision avoidance, considering the upper LEO belt, the most demanding test case. The proposed sensor is the core element of an Optical Network which, for objects orbiting in the high LEO, can in principle increase performances with a relatively small impact on the overall system costs, compared to radar systems so far considered as baseline for LEO observations.