AIAA Plug-n-Play Mission Operations Workshop

May 16-17, 2011

San Jose, California

Motivation

Ongoing and planned programs within NASA, the DoD and academia have indicated a need to be able to routinely operate multiple small spacecraft in support of science and technology missions. However, as the number of these missions is expected to grow rapidly, the associated cost to develop and operate unique ground control stations and networks will become prohibitive costly to the sponsoring organizations.

The American Institute for Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA), the University of Hawaii Space Flight Laboratory, and San Jose State University Aerospace Engineering, with participation from NASA, DoD, and academia, have organized this workshop to foster collaboration and leveraging of existing and developing capabilities that may be collectively utilized by the smallsat community for space operations. To this end, the workshop will explore the adoption of standards and existing capabilities as well as the creation of new technologies that will enable space mission developers to plan, design, and operate their spacecraft using a common architecture in order to reduce cost and overall mission risk.

The PPMO workshop program is planned in two segments. The first segment will investigate the various needs of the smallsat communities (military, civil and educational space) and will also touch on existing systems and capabilities. The second part of the workshop will consist of facilitated discussions organized into categories along the lines of Approaches (programmatic and related issues), Implementation (technical solutions and architectures), and Applications (concept of operations, mission types and users).

Goals

• Identify candidate networks, technologies, and related systems that can contribute to the realization and implementation of a low-cost, distributed ground control network, as part of a larger Plug-and-Play approach to smallsat design
  • Understand the current capabilities of existing networks and systems
  • Identify the needs of the users of these networks
• Identify and describe the levels of interest and potential for collaboration and contributions from the various participants

Please Note:

The PPMO Workshop and associated website are open forums with likely international participation. Please be sure that all materials that you upload to the website and/or hand out during the workshop have been reviewed and approved as International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) and Export Administration Regulations (EAR) compliant by your home institution.

Organizing Committee: