National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Small Business Innovation Research & Technology Transfer 2003 Program Solicitations

TOPIC F2 Self-Sufficient Space Systems

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F2.01 In Situ Resources Utilization of Planetary Materials for Human Space Missions
F2.02 Multi-agent and Human-centric Systems Technologies
F2.03 Modular Spacecraft Systems


The goal of this topic is to drive down the cost of human/robotic exploration missions and campaigns. This includes supporting improved health/safety for human explorers beyond Earth orbit. It also includes working with the space science community to test concepts and technologies. Specific objectives of this topic include 1) developing and validating the technology to utilize local resources, such as Regolith / Minerals, Ices and Atmosphere -- in order to produce, process and deliver consumables, including propellants -- storable and cryogenic; Life Support and other gases; and Water, 2) fabricate key physical structural systems/elements from local materials, including radiation shielding; structural elements (e.g., trusses, panels, etc.); and mechanical spares for mission system elements, 3) Enable local fabrication of selected "finished products" and/or "end-items", including photo-voltaic cells and solar arrays, wires, tubes, connectors, etc., and pressurized volumes, 4) Testing key technologies and demonstrate innovative new systems concepts in space, and 5) establishing a foundation for profitable commercial development of space applications of these technologies in the mid- to far-term.

F2.01 In Situ Resources Utilization of Planetary Materials for Human Space Missions
Lead Center: JSC
Participating Center(s): ARC, KSC, MSFC

The great explorers of the Earth learned to live off the land for food, clothing, replacement of lost or broken items, transportation, and shelter as they ventured far and long from their own bases of support. Likewise, it is fundamental to any program of extended human presence in near-Earth space (Earth-Moon and Earth-Sun libration points and the lunar surface), and to Mars and other planetary bodies that we learn how to make the maximum use of local, indigenous materials as a source for products such as propellants, life support consumables, spare parts, radiation protection, and fabrication and construction materials and products. By pursuing the philosophy of "make what you need where you need it" instead of bringing it all the way from Earth, In Situ Resource Utilization (ISRU) can result in a reduction of mass requirements for exploration missions, a reduction in mission risk and cost, and expanded human presence in near-Earth space on extraterrestrial surfaces. It can also enable the long-term commercial development of space by enabling low cost transportation and providing the resources, technologies, and the capabilities required to allow infrastructure and commercial development activities to grow.

For any ISRU concept to be successfully implemented, the concept must be (i) easily transportable, (ii) minimize the mass which must be brought from the Earth (including the equipment required to move or process the resource), (iii) minimize the power and Earth supplied processing consumables needed to perform its function, (iv) require little or no maintenance, (v) operate in extreme environments if not used in habitable enclosures, (vi) require little or no human supervision, crew operation, and crew training, and (vii) must enable or enhance new mission concepts not possible without the use of space produced products and consumables.

All ISRU activities can be divided into one or more of the five focused task areas below. Proposals can be submitted for any single or combination of these task areas, but proposals should not ignore the complexity or challenges associated with linked areas not covered (ex. proposals on resource processing should not ignore the potential resource collection and conditioning challenges).

Resource Collection and Conditioning
ISRU requires efficient excavation and transport of resources in extremely cold (ex, permanent shadowed lunar crater, dusty/abrasive, and/or micro-g environments (e.g., asteroids, comets, Mars moons, etc.). Proposals of interest include methods and systems for digging, sorting, mineral separation, and transporting regolith or other surface materials to a processing reactor in reduced gravity.

Resource Processing & Refining
ISRU requires efficient and economical production of propellants, mission critical consumables, and feedstock (such as silicon, aluminum, iron, and plastic) for use in in situ manufacturing. Proposals of interest include methods for extracting, collecting, and processing in situ materials into usable products or feedstock from atmospheric, surface, and subsurface space resources and/or life support and power system byproducts and waste. Also of interest are methods for gas separation and purification with membranes or adsorption processes for atmospheric raw materials (planetary bodies with atmospheres, Mars, etc.), in process operations (metal oxide reductions, Moon, Mars, etc), product purification, and life-support. Emphasis should be placed on innovative designs and processes. Proposals for water/ice extraction or drilling should recognize the uncertainty and potential variability of both the location and abundance of such water.

In Situ Manufacturing
ISRU requires processing and manufacturing techniques capable of producing 100's to 1000's their own mass of product in their useful lifetimes, with reasonable quality. In situ manufacturing can use either in situ or Earth supplied feedstock. Proposals of interest include methods for processing Earth supplied, Moon, Mars, and asteroid surface materials or processed feedstock into useful equipment (e.g., solar panels, radio antennas, replacement parts, etc.) and construction materials, which require little or no further manufacturing or assembly that enable long-term settlement.

In Situ Construction
Proposals of interest include construction and erection techniques capable of producing complex structural elements (trusses, beams, shells, etc.) and complete structures from a variety of available or in situ manufactured materials and the minimum of Earth supplied consumables. Maintenance, repair, and replacement costs must be less than 20% (min) of the cost of Earth delivered equipment and products. Of particular interest are free form fabrication or forming technologies that can utilize direct or minimally processed local materials and are easily transportable.

End-to-End System Integration
To minimize mass, volume, and power ISRU processes must be structurally, thermally, and electrically integrated to a significant degree. Proposals of interest include methods of packaging ISRU collection, reactor, separation, distribution, and control equipment that significantly reduce total package mass, volume, and power requirements for use in robotic and human mission applications.

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F2.02 Multi-agent and Human-centric Systems Technologies
Lead Center: ARC

NASA will expand future human space flight exploration with highly trained human and robotic agents, capable of working intelligently and collectively together. Multitudes of autonomous systems and small teams of humans must work seamlessly together for efficient operations and effective scientific discovery, and will need to provide effective support for one another, even in harsh and unpredictable environments.

To achieve these ambitious exploration goals, researchers must develop a broad spectrum of technologies for robust, self-learning and evolvable systems with varying degrees of system level autonomy. Large multi-agent systems will work fully autonomously, yet collaboratively across different capabilities (such as a “swarm” of scout probes on an alien surface to search and roadmap for future human exploration. Other partially self-sufficient systems might operate automated experiments on a remote planetary surface or on ISS, yet communicate as needed for human guidance as anomalous data or significant results are experienced. Still other systems might serve as single agent assistants for various astronauts to help monitor Shuttle, ISS or perhaps future planetary habitat systems that may require ongoing monitoring, control, diagnosis, and repair.

To complement this varying degree of multi-agent autonomy, a correspondingly complex level of human-centric interfaces will need to be developed to ensure a total system design approach that properly integrates multi-agent computational systems with human performance and constraints, such that the total system of systems amplifies, corrects, and leverages the capabilities of both people and machines. In order to achieve this, the architectural requirements of multi-agent systems are required, plus fundamental theories of human perceptual, cognitive, and social systems that anticipate the context and contribution of human behavior in which technologies are utilized and maintained. Beyond this, the harsh realities of working in space environments must be thoroughly understood, so tools such as electronic notebooks, alarm systems, and scheduling systems are adapted to the living and work environment of a space habitat or planetary explorers.

To achieve these space systems technology goals, proposals are sought in the following areas:


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F2.03 Modular Spacecraft Systems
Lead Center: GSFC
Participating Center(s): ARC, JSC, MSFC

There is a need for large and complex space systems in the missions of the future. The traditional monolithic approach to such large structures has always resulted in complex, custom designs with a rigid system architecture that had to be integrated on the ground before launch. Expensive heavy-lift launch vehicles were required to get them to orbit. This approach depended on a large initial investment and the resulting mission risk was substantial.

A new modular concept for engineering these large space systems is based on expandable and reconfigurable system architectures that will be integrated in space using intelligent modules of a general purpose design. These modules could be launched into orbit by medium expendable launch vehicles and once deployed would either assemble themselves or be assembled (human, robotic or a combination of both) into a pre-determined configuration. This lowers the overall risk to the mission because the loss of any one launch vehicle would only represent a small portion of the overall system. It also allows the cost to be spread out over many years and the cost of the individual modules will only be a low recurring cost because they are produced in mass quantities.

This subtopic will develop the technology building blocks to enable the assembly of these large space systems from a variety of modular components. There are deployable modules such as solar arrays, antennas and radiators. There are large integrated modules, such as habitation modules. And there are structural modules, such as truss elements, large aperture telescope elements and phased array microwave antenna elements. The assembly of these modules will require innovative construction approaches using either autonomous self-assembly, human (EVA) assembly, robotic assembly, or a combination of human and robotic assembly.

Questions that must be addressed as part of the infrastructure are the module interfaces and the module resources and services (power, data, thermal, communications and control). The functionality of each modular component must be considered in the context of the overall integrated system.

Reconfigurable Systems
One significant advantage of a modular approach to space systems is that it lends itself naturally to reconfigurable systems. Reconfigurability is a concept that allows the reassignment of functionality among modules in the event of a system failure or a change in mission objectives. Systems can be reconfigured before launch or on orbit. Before launch space vehicles can be assembled from a stable of modular components to provide a launch-on-demand capability. This permits late assignment of functionality to a particular mission. For example, today we may need a reconnaissance capability with adequate propellant for plane changes. Tomorrow we may need to call up a communications capability with multiple high-bandwidth transponders. Using existing “plug-and-play” modules we can quickly assemble the needed elements that will meet the particular mission objectives.

On orbit there are many advantages to being able to reconfigure a system. For example, a system may autonomously reassign functions among modules in the event of a failure so that other modules pick up the function that was performed by the failed modules. We may choose to alter the mission objective and transform the reflector for a large space telescope into a microwave synthetic aperture radar. Modularity is what enables this flexibility. The economic advantages of such a capability are enormous.

In this subtopic we invite proposals that support the overall goal of developing technologies for intelligent modular systems for the assembly of large space structures and for the reconfiguration of any space system. This includes ground and flight testbeds and demonstrations for these intelligent modular systems.

There are four specific key functional areas of research:

Intelligent Modular Architectures
This area addresses innovative system architectures in which larger space systems are autonomously assembled in orbit by the coordinated effort of many intelligent modules. The functionality of each module, the logic for self-assembly and the cooperative aspects of the modules in the fully assembled system are areas of interest.

Several new missions of exploration and space operations envision architectures that are based on what are called Gateway stations at the L1 and L2 Lagrange points. Exploration missions launched from these Lagrange points require relatively small changes in velocity to reach their destinations. With Lagrange points used as mission assembly points, many exploration missions may be assembled, launched and operated from these locations. Such architectures will require a complex infrastructure of reusable modular components for transportation from low Earth orbit as well as for intelligent self-assembly at the Lagrange point.

Modular systems offer the opportunity to build in system capabilities in a manner that is both highly efficient and capable of interacting with many other such modules to create “systems of systems” of great complexity. Such capabilities include science planning and execution, guidance and navigation, autonomous capabilities of various levels, and system health management.

Modular Electronics
The realization of modular architectures depends on the modularity of the electronics. This area will explore innovative approaches to modular electronics, everything from plug-in assemblies to smart chips embedded in the structure. The interconnectivity and the functional reconfigurability of the electronic elements are important considerations.

Distributed Intelligence
This area addresses the concept of modularity in the computational capabilities of space assets in which many intelligent modules form the nodes of a larger computing network thereby making the whole more intelligent than the sum of all the parts. Each module is autonomous in itself, yet contributes to the overall intelligence of the assembled space system.

Reconfigurable Modular Architectures
This area investigates new and innovative design concepts for modular space systems that makes reconfiguration possible, either prior to launch or on orbit. Capability for survivability, adaptability and interoperability are to be considered. Survivability should address longer life through system redundancy, graceful degradation, self repair and either human or autonomous servicing. Adaptability focuses on agile missions that evolve and adapt to changing mission needs both in terms of resource management and data-gathering functionality. Interoperability addresses plug-and-play subsystems and payloads for reduced time and cost for system development and integration.


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