SAO PAULO (Reuters) - Brazilian scientists were trying on Wednesday to reestablish broken contact with a research satellite launched only last week, the Science and Technology Ministry said.

A ministry spokesman said the flight control center knew the Saci-1's position in orbit, but could not communicate with the $4.6 million probe, which has equipment for scientific experiments with plasma and cosmic rays and to research earth's atmospheric emissions.

"The Saci-1 is in the right orbit but it has communications problems,'' the spokesman said, adding that the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) was helping to trace the satellite.

Scientists suspected a malfunction on Earth or a glitch in the satellite's communications system, which the spokesman said they still hoped to be able to fix without losing the probe.

Two years ago, Brazil's space program suffered a major setback when a space rocket with a satellite on board exploded soon after blast-off from the Maranhao launch pad.