Computer Engineering Commons^™

An Intelligent Attitude Determination And Control System Concept For A Cubesat Class Spacecraft, Jeremy Straub

Jeremy Straub

An attitude determination and control system (ADCS) is used to orient a spacecraft for a wide variety of purposes (e.g., to keep a camera facing Earth or orient the spacecraft for propulsion system use). The proposed intelligent ADCS has several key features: first, it can be used in multiple modes, spanning from passive stabilization of two axes and unconstrained spin on a third to three-axis full active stabilization. It also includes electromagnetic components to ‘dump’ spin from the reaction wheels. Second, the ADCS utilizes an incorporated autonomous control algorithm to characterize the effect of actuation of the system components and, …

An Onboard Distributed Multiprocessing System For A Cubesat Spacecraft Created From Gumstix Computer-On-Module Units, Michael Wegerson, Jeremy Straub, Ronald Marsh

Jeremy Straub

The OpenOrbiter Small Spacecraft Development Initiative at the University of North Dakota [1] aims to make ac-cess to space for research and educational purposes easier by enabling the creation of low-cost CubeSats. It is creating the Open Prototype for Educational Nanosats (OPEN), a framework for developing a 1-U CubeSat space-craft with a parts cost of less than $5,000 [2]. The designs [3], documentation and computer code from this will be made publically available to enable the development of programs at other institutions.

Openorbiter Operating Software, Dayln Limesand, Christoffer Korvald, Jeremy Straub, Ronald Marsh

Jeremy Straub

The operating software team of the OpenOrbiter project has been tasked with developing software for general spacecraft maintenance, performing mission tasks and the monitoring of system critical aspects of the spacecraft. To do so, the team is developing an autonomous system that will be able to continuously check sensors for data, and schedule tasks that pertain to the current mission and general maintenance of the onboard systems. Development in support of these objectives is ongoing with work focusing on the completion of the development of a stable system. This poster will present an overview of current work on the project …

Scheduling For A Small Satellite For Remote Sensed Data Collection, Donovan Torgerson, Christoffer Korvalnd, Jeremy Straub, Ronald Marsh

Jeremy Straub

Small satellites, such as CubeSats, serve as excellent platforms for the collection of data that can be supplied to a geographic information system. To serve this need, they require a robust and lightweight task scheduler due to their limited onboard power production capabilities as well as internal space restrictions. Because of these constraints, schedules must be optimized; however, the scheduling optimization process must be performed using limited processing (CPU) power.

Several considerations must be taken into account in order to make a scheduler for these systems. This poster highlights requirements such as inter-dependency of onboard systems, and limited windows of …

Model-Based Software Engineering For An Imaging Cubesat And Its Extrapolation To Other Missions, Atif Mohammad, Jeremy Straub, Christoffer Korvald, Emanuel Grant

Jeremy Straub

Small satellites with their limited computational capabilities require that software engineering techniques promote efficient use of spacecraft resources. A model-driven approach to software engineering is an excellent solution to this resource maximization challenge as it facilitates visualization of the key solution processes and data elements.

The software engineering process utilized for the OpenOrbiter spacecraft, which is a remote sensing technology demonstrator, is presented. Key challenges presented by the Open Orbiter project included concurrent operation and tasking of five computer-on-module (COM) units and a flight computer and the associated data marshaling between local and general storage. The payload processing system (consisting …

Open Space Box Model: Service Oriented Architecture Framework For Small Spacecraft Collaboration And Control, Atif F. Mohammad, Jeremy Straub

Jeremy Straub

A Cubesat is a small satellite with very less competence to compute, it requires software engineering techniques, which can enhance the computational power for this small box. A model-driven approach of software engineering, which is called OSBM or Open Space Box Modeling technique, is an excellent solution to this re-source maximization challenge. OSBM facilitates apparition of the key solution pro-cesses computation and satellite related data elements using Service Oriented Ar-chitecture 3.0 (SOA 3.0) as base to work on to design services. The key challenges that can be handled by utilizing OSBM include concurrent operation and tasking of few as five …