The good news is UND researchers have figured out the glitch in the Agcam system now mounted on the International Space Station.
The bad news is it probably won't get fixed until next summer.
Project manager Doug Olsen said that, after a lot of trouble-shooting, the problem was isolated to an electronic box. The box returned to Earth on the last space shuttle flight in September, he said, and UND students and faculty will be trying to repair it.
He said he hopes the work would be done in time for another shuttle flight in the summer.
The Agcam system is supposed to send high-res, near-infrared images of farmland to help farmers tell healthy crops from unhealthy ones and apply fertilizer and pesticide more efficiently. It's been sending corrupted images instead. It went into orbit a year ago.
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Olsen said that since UND has to send the electronic box back up, there's an opportunity to bring a better camera system up as well.
