3,305 research outputs found
Application of advanced technology to space automation
Automated operations in space provide the key to optimized mission design and data acquisition at minimum cost for the future. The results of this study strongly accentuate this statement and should provide further incentive for immediate development of specific automtion technology as defined herein. Essential automation technology requirements were identified for future programs. The study was undertaken to address the future role of automation in the space program, the potential benefits to be derived, and the technology efforts that should be directed toward obtaining these benefits
Tasking Framework: Parallelization of Computations in Onboard Control Systems
For the next generation of onboard computer in space application a high demand on processing power exists. Currently used onboard system didn't provide the necessary computing power. The in the paper describe tasking frame work is the core processing model for the OBC-NG (On Board Computer - Next Generation) operating system with an reactive computing model
Toward Global Sensing Quality Maximization: A Configuration Optimization Scheme for Camera Networks
The performance of a camera network monitoring a set of targets depends
crucially on the configuration of the cameras. In this paper, we investigate
the reconfiguration strategy for the parameterized camera network model, with
which the sensing qualities of the multiple targets can be optimized globally
and simultaneously. We first propose to use the number of pixels occupied by a
unit-length object in image as a metric of the sensing quality of the object,
which is determined by the parameters of the camera, such as intrinsic,
extrinsic, and distortional coefficients. Then, we form a single quantity that
measures the sensing quality of the targets by the camera network. This
quantity further serves as the objective function of our optimization problem
to obtain the optimal camera configuration. We verify the effectiveness of our
approach through extensive simulations and experiments, and the results reveal
its improved performance on the AprilTag detection tasks. Codes and related
utilities for this work are open-sourced and available at
https://github.com/sszxc/MultiCam-Simulation.Comment: The 2022 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and
Systems (IROS 2022
Parallel Architectures for Planetary Exploration Requirements (PAPER)
The Parallel Architectures for Planetary Exploration Requirements (PAPER) project is essentially research oriented towards technology insertion issues for NASA's unmanned planetary probes. It was initiated to complement and augment the long-term efforts for space exploration with particular reference to NASA/LaRC's (NASA Langley Research Center) research needs for planetary exploration missions of the mid and late 1990s. The requirements for space missions as given in the somewhat dated Advanced Information Processing Systems (AIPS) requirements document are contrasted with the new requirements from JPL/Caltech involving sensor data capture and scene analysis. It is shown that more stringent requirements have arisen as a result of technological advancements. Two possible architectures, the AIPS Proof of Concept (POC) configuration and the MAX Fault-tolerant dataflow multiprocessor, were evaluated. The main observation was that the AIPS design is biased towards fault tolerance and may not be an ideal architecture for planetary and deep space probes due to high cost and complexity. The MAX concepts appears to be a promising candidate, except that more detailed information is required. The feasibility for adding neural computation capability to this architecture needs to be studied. Key impact issues for architectural design of computing systems meant for planetary missions were also identified
Routing Physarum with electrical flow/current
Plasmodium stage of Physarum polycephalum behaves as a distributed dynamical
pattern formation mechanism who's foraging and migration is influenced by local
stimuli from a wide range of attractants and repellents. Complex protoplasmic
tube network structures are formed as a result, which serve as efficient
`circuits' by which nutrients are distributed to all parts of the organism. We
investigate whether this `bottom-up' circuit routing method may be harnessed in
a controllable manner as a possible alternative to conventional template-based
circuit design. We interfaced the plasmodium of Physarum polycephalum to the
planar surface of the spatially represented computing device, (Mills' Extended
Analog Computer, or EAC), implemented as a sheet of analog computing material
whose behaviour is input and read by a regular 5x5 array of electrodes. We
presented a pattern of current distribution to the array and found that we were
able to select the directional migration of the plasmodium growth front by
exploiting plasmodium electro-taxis towards current sinks. We utilised this
directional guidance phenomenon to route the plasmodium across its habitat and
were able to guide the migration around obstacles represented by repellent
current sources. We replicated these findings in a collective particle model of
Physarum polycephalum which suggests further methods to orient, route, confine
and release the plasmodium using spatial patterns of current sources and sinks.
These findings demonstrate proof of concept in the low-level dynamical routing
for biologically implemented circuit design
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