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ISIS 1 and 2 (" International Satellites for Ionospheric Studies") were the third and fourth in a series of Canadian launched to study the ionosphere over one complete solar cycle. After the success of Canada's Alouette 1, Canada and the United States jointly sent up three more satellites in the ISIS program. The first was named Alouette 2 (after originally being named ISIS-X). As was the case for the Alouette satellites, RCA Ltd. of Montreal was the prime contractor for both ISIS 1 and 2.
A third satellite, ISIS 3, was scheduled for construction, but when the government's focus shifted toward communications satellites, it was cancelled in 1969. The funds were instead used to produce the Communications Technology Satellite (also known as Hermes), which was launched in 1976.
Unlike the Alouette satellites, ISIS had complex navigational equipment and a tape recorder to record some experiments when they were out of communications range and play back the results when the satellites came over Canada again. Some other experiments were not recorded but data was sent in over several stations around the globe. In total it conducted 10 experiments.
On March 13, 1984, both ISIS 1 and ISIS 2 were loaned to Japan's Communications Research Laboratory, which continued to operate the satellites until 1990, when they were shut down due to deterioration of battery capacity.
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