Project Morpheus: Lean Development of a Terrestrial Flight Testbed for Maturing NASA Lander Technologies

NASA's Morpheus Project has developed and tested a prototype planetary lander capable of vertical takeoff and landing that is designed to serve as a testbed for advanced spacecraft technologies. The lander vehicle, propelled by a Liquid Oxygen (LOX)/Methane engine and sized to carry a 500kg payload to the lunar surface, provides a platform for bringing technologies from the laboratory into an integrated flight system at relatively low cost. In 2012, Morpheus began integrating the Autonomous Landing and Hazard Avoidance Technology (ALHAT) sensors and software onto the vehicle in order to demonstrate safe, autonomous landing and hazard avoidance. From the beginning, one of goals for the Morpheus Project was to streamline agency processes and practices. The Morpheus project accepted a challenge to tailor the traditional NASA systems engineering approach in a way that would be appropriate for a lower cost, rapid prototype engineering effort, but retain the essence of the guiding principles. This paper describes the tailored project life cycle and systems engineering approach for the Morpheus project, including the processes, tools, and amount of rigor employed over the project's multiple lifecycles since the project began in fiscal year (FY) 2011

Project Morpheus: Morpheus 1.5A Lander Failure Investigation Results

On August 9, 2012 the Morpheus 1.5A vehicle crashed shortly after lift off from the Kennedy Space Center. The loss was limited to the vehicle itself which was pre-declared to be a test failure and not a mishap. The Morpheus project is demonstrating advanced technologies for in space and planetary surface vehicles including: autonomous flight control, landing site hazard identification and safe site selection, relative surface and hazard navigation, precision landing, modular reusable flight software, and high performance, non-toxic, cryogenic liquid Oxygen and liquid Methane integrated main engine and attitude control propulsion system. A comprehensive failure investigation isolated the fault to the Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) data path to the flight computer. Several improvements have been identified and implemented for the 1.5B and 1.5C vehicles

Preparation and Integration of ALHAT Precision Landing Technology for Morpheus Flight Testing

The Autonomous precision Landing and Hazard Avoidance Technology (ALHAT) project has developed a suite of prototype sensors for enabling autonomous and safe precision land- ing of robotic or crewed vehicles on solid solar bodies under varying terrain lighting condi- tions. The sensors include a Lidar-based Hazard Detection System (HDS), a multipurpose Navigation Doppler Lidar (NDL), and a long-range Laser Altimeter (LAlt). Preparation for terrestrial ight testing of ALHAT onboard the Morpheus free- ying, rocket-propelled ight test vehicle has been in progress since 2012, with ight tests over a lunar-like ter- rain eld occurring in Spring 2014. Signi cant work e orts within both the ALHAT and Morpheus projects has been required in the preparation of the sensors, vehicle, and test facilities for interfacing, integrating and verifying overall system performance to ensure readiness for ight testing. The ALHAT sensors have undergone numerous stand-alone sensor tests, simulations, and calibrations, along with integrated-system tests in special- ized gantries, trucks, helicopters and xed-wing aircraft. A lunar-like terrain environment was constructed for ALHAT system testing during Morpheus ights, and vibration and thermal testing of the ALHAT sensors was performed based on Morpheus ights prior to ALHAT integration. High- delity simulations were implemented to gain insight into integrated ALHAT sensors and Morpheus GN&C system performance, and command and telemetry interfacing and functional testing was conducted once the ALHAT sensors and electronics were integrated onto Morpheus. This paper captures some of the details and lessons learned in the planning, preparation and integration of the individual ALHAT sen- sors, the vehicle, and the test environment that led up to the joint ight tests

GN and C Subsystem Concept for Safe Precision Landing of the Proposed Lunar MARE Robotic Science Mission

The Lunar MARE (Moon Age and Regolith Explorer) Discovery Mission concept targets delivery of a science payload to the lunar surface for sample collection and dating. The mission science is within a 100-meter radius region of smooth lunar maria terrain near Aristarchus crater. The location has several small, sharp craters and rocks that present landing hazards to the spacecraft. For successful delivery of the science payload to the surface, the vehicle Guidance, Navigation and Control (GN&C) subsystem requires safe and precise landing capability, so design infuses the NASA Autonomous precision Landing and Hazard Avoidance Technology (ALHAT) and a gimbaled, throttleable LOX/LCH4 main engine. The ALHAT system implemented for Lunar MARE is a specialization of prototype technologies in work within NASA for the past two decades, including a passive optical Terrain Relative Navigation (TRN) sensor, a Navigation Doppler Lidar (NDL) velocity and range sensor, and a Lidar-based Hazard Detection (HD) sensor. The landing descent profile is from a retrograde orbit over lighted terrain with landing near lunar dawn. The GN&C subsystem with ALHAT capabilities will deliver the science payload to the lunar surface within a 20-meter landing ellipse of the target location and at a site having greater than 99% safety probability, which minimizes risk to safe landing and delivery of the MARE science payload to the intended terrain region