Development of a knowledge management system for the NOMAD instrument onboard the ExoMars TGO spacecraft

Purpose This paper aims to describe the development of a knowledge management system (KMS) for the Nadir and Occultation for Mars Discovery (NOMAD) instrument on board the ESA/Roscosmos 2016 ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO) spacecraft. The KMS collects knowledge acquired during the engineering process that involved over 30 project partners. In addition to the documentation and technical data (explicit knowledge), a dedicated effort was made to collect the gained experience (tacit knowledge) that is crucial for the operational phase of the TGO mission and also for future projects. The system is now in service and provides valuable information for the scientists and engineers working with NOMAD Design/methodology/approach The NOMAD KMS was built around six areas: official documentation, technical specifications and test results, lessons learned, management data (proposals, deliverables, progress reports and minutes of meetings), picture files and movie files. Today, the KMS contains 110 GB of data spread over 11,000 documents and more than 13,000 media files. A computer-aided design (CAD) library contains a model of the full instrument as well as exported sub-parts in different formats. A context search engine for both documents and media files was implemented. Findings The conceived KMS design is basic, flexible and very robust. It can be adapted to future projects of a similar size. Practical implications The paper provides practical guidelines on how to retain the knowledge from a larger aerospace project. The KMS tool presented here works offline, requires no maintenance and conforms to data protection standards. Originality/value This paper shows how knowledge management requirements for space missions can be fulfilled. The paper demonstrates how to transform the large collection of project data into a useful tool and how to address usability aspects

BepiColombo Venus Flyby Science Operations Feasibility Analysis

BepiColombo is an interdisciplinary ESA mission to explore the planet Mercury in cooperation with the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA). The mission consists of 2 spacecraft, ESA’s Mercury Planetary Orbiter (MPO) and JAXA’s Mercury Magnetospheric Orbiter (MMO) that carry in total 17 science payloads for the investigation of Mercury’s structure, interior, composition, morphology, formation, evolution and environment. The Mercury Composite Spacecraft (MCS) made of MPO, MMO, a Mercury Transfer Module (MTM) and a sunshield (MOSIF) will be launched on an escape trajectory that will bring it into heliocentric orbit on its way to Mercury. During the cruise of 7.2 years toward the inner part of the Solar System, BepiColombo will make 1 flyby to the Earth, 2 to Venus, and 6 to Mercury. Only part of its payload will be obstructed by the sunshield and the cruise spacecraft configuration, so that the flybys will allow operations of many instruments, like: spectrometers at many wavelengths, accelerometer, radiometer, ion and electron detectors. A scientific working group (VFBWG, Venus Fly-by Working Group) has recently formed inside the BepiColombo community to identify potentially interesting scientific cases and to promote collaborations during the Venus flybys. At the same time, analyses of science operations requests has been carried out by the Science Ground Segment (SGS) at ESAC and the Operational Ground Segment (OGS) at ESOC to help scientists in the comprehension of feasibility of proposed investigations. The analysis of science observations includes special spacecraft pointing feasibility analysis taking into account the attitude constraints. During interplanetary cruise and outside electric propulsion, the default attitude of MCS is with +Y axis pointed to the Sun. The spacecraft attitude is then adjusted by ground around the sun line such that the angular momentum loading is minimized while ground contact is maximized during ground station passes. For the short duration of scientific interest around the Venus closest approaches, however, the need for angular momentum load minimization can be relaxed and it is possible to offset the Sun direction in the spacecraft composite +YZ plane. The SGS at ESAC developed a tool that allows to check the possibility of observing Venus in different spacecraft configurations for different instruments, for example finding out when Venus is inside a given instrument FoV. With that tool and based on the scientific instruments pointing requests, candidate pointing timelines were extracted, indicating that it is possible to find a suitable spacecraft composite attitude to provide observing opportunities to most instruments requiring specific spacecraft pointing. In addition, the OGS at ESOC analysed the impact of the received scientific requests on power balance, thermal balance and data return and found well within the as-designed capability of the spacecraft. This paper includes a summary of the scientific requests, the analysis carried out by both SGS and OGS and the results of the analysis

BepiColombo Science Investigations During Cruise and Flybys at the Earth, Venus and Mercury

The dual spacecraft mission BepiColombo is the first joint mission between the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) to explore the planet Mercury. BepiColombo was launched from Kourou (French Guiana) on October 20th, 2018, in its packed configuration including two spacecraft, a transfer module, and a sunshield. BepiColombo cruise trajectory is a long journey into the inner heliosphere, and it includes one flyby of the Earth (in April 2020), two of Venus (in October 2020 and August 2021), and six of Mercury (starting from 2021), before orbit insertion in December 2025. A big part of the mission instruments will be fully operational during the mission cruise phase, allowing unprecedented investigation of the different environments that will encounter during the 7-years long cruise. The present paper reviews all the planetary flybys and some interesting cruise configurations. Additional scientific research that will emerge in the coming years is also discussed, including the instruments that can contribute

Design status of ASPIICS, an externally occulted coronagraph for PROBA-3

The "sonic region" of the Sun corona remains extremely difficult to observe with spatial resolution and sensitivity sufficient to understand the fine scale phenomena that govern the quiescent solar corona, as well as phenomena that lead to coronal mass ejections (CMEs), which influence space weather. Improvement on this front requires eclipse-like conditions over long observation times. The space-borne coronagraphs flown so far provided a continuous coverage of the external parts of the corona but their over-occulting system did not permit to analyse the part of the white-light corona where the main coronal mass is concentrated. The proposed PROBA-3 Coronagraph System, also known as ASPIICS (Association of Spacecraft for Polarimetric and Imaging Investigation of the Corona of the Sun), with its novel design, will be the first space coronagraph to cover the range of radial distances between ~1.08 and 3 solar radii where the magnetic field plays a crucial role in the coronal dynamics, thus providing continuous observational conditions very close to those during a total solar eclipse. PROBA-3 is first a mission devoted to the in-orbit demonstration of precise formation flying techniques and technologies for future European missions, which will fly ASPIICS as primary payload. The instrument is distributed over two satellites flying in formation (approx. 150m apart) to form a giant coronagraph capable of producing a nearly perfect eclipse allowing observing the sun corona closer to the rim than ever before. The coronagraph instrument is developed by a large European consortium including about 20 partners from 7 countries under the auspices of the European Space Agency. This paper is reviewing the recent improvements and design updates of the ASPIICS instrument as it is stepping into the detailed design phase

Spectroscopic observations of the 2011 Draconids meteor shower

International audienceSpectroscopic observations of meteors reveals the chemical composition of parent bodies and interplanetary dust. Draconids are an example of most fragile meteoroids, bringing us information about physical properties of the comet 21P/Giacobini-Zinner. During the 2011 Draconids meteor shower, airborne and ground-based meteor spectroscopic observations carried out. Here, we report on the results for spectra captured by cameras provided by the IMCCE, ESA, SETI Institute, and Ondrejov Observatory. Collected by us spectra show two dominant emissions of sodium line at 5890 Å and the magnesium line at 5180 Å. Moreover, other emision lines belong to iron and the N2 molecule.

Spectroscopic observations of the 2011 Draconids meteor shower

International audienceSpectroscopic observations of meteors reveals the chemical composition of parent bodies and interplanetary dust. Draconids are an example of most fragile meteoroids, bringing us information about physical properties of the comet 21P/Giacobini-Zinner. During the 2011 Draconids meteor shower, airborne and ground-based meteor spectroscopic observations carried out. Here, we report on the results for spectra captured by cameras provided by the IMCCE, ESA, SETI Institute, and Ondrejov Observatory. Collected by us spectra show two dominant emissions of sodium line at 5890 Å and the magnesium line at 5180 Å. Moreover, other emision lines belong to iron and the N2 molecule.

Spectroscopic observations of the 2011 Draconids meteor shower

International audienc

Spectroscopic observations of the 2011 Draconids meteor shower

International audienc

Spectroscopic observations of the 2011 Draconids meteor shower

International audienc

Spectroscopic observations of the 2011 Draconids meteor shower

International audienceSpectroscopic observations of meteors reveals the chemical composition of parent bodies and interplanetary dust. Draconids are an example of most fragile meteoroids, bringing us information about physical properties of the comet 21P/Giacobini-Zinner. During the 2011 Draconids meteor shower, airborne and ground-based meteor spectroscopic observations carried out. Here, we report on the results for spectra captured by cameras provided by the IMCCE, ESA, SETI Institute, and Ondrejov Observatory. Collected by us spectra show two dominant emissions of sodium line at 5890 Å and the magnesium line at 5180 Å. Moreover, other emision lines belong to iron and the N2 molecule.