The next frontier in space is closer than you think – welcome to the world of very low Earth orbit satellites

Illustration of debris in orbit around Earth.

This article was originally published at The Conversation. The publication contributed the article to Space.com's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights.

There are about 15,000 satellites orbiting the Earth. Most of them, like the International Space Station and the Hubble Telescope, reside in low Earth orbit, or LEO, which tops out at about 1,200 miles (2,000 kilometers) above the Earth’s surface.