Real-time Object Modeling Executive for Mission Operations

ROME (Real-time Object Modeling Executive) is a framework which facilitates modelbased operations (MBO) for various spacecraft missions. It arose from a need for more responsive and accurate state-of-health (SOH) assessment capabilities of ever increasingly complex space missions. Research on ROME has lead to a method by which models created during the design phase can be easily reused in the operations phase of a mission to provide both increased mission assurance and decreased operational cost. The main function performed by the ROME framework is to predict future SOH conditions by executing forward-predicting simulations of high fidelity models for the given subsystems. This process is known as profiling. Profiling consists of seeding a model with initial state parameters, propagating the model over a specified duration (including the ability to inject a future command list), archiving the output, and distributing the results to the appropriate systems or personnel. ROME has been used to profile models in both realtime and offline modes. Profiles generated in real-time use live telemetry to initialize the starting parameters of the model. This profiling mode is frequently used during periods of contact with the spacecraft to provide immediate feedback of the state of the systems. Alternatively, profiles have been run in an offline mode, using predefined initialization parameters and allowing for propagation over several weeks. Both of these profiling modes can execute models built using various commercial modeling and simulation environments, such as MATLAB and Simulink. ROME has been designed to work with the GMSEC (Goddard Mission Services and Evolution Center) software bus. GMSEC is a Message Oriented Middleware (MOM) protocol that enables pluggable and swappable components within a mission operations center (MOC) environment. Since ROME was designed to ‘speak’ GMSEC, it is able to play an interactive role with GMSEC, or other MOM, enabled applications. As an example, ROME is often triggered via a message sent from another application within the MOC. It can, however, be tasked to begin a profile directly through the user interface. Once the profile is complete, the results are sent across the software bus to any other subscribing system. ROME has been flight tested on Space Technology – 5 (ST5), a three month constellation mission consisting of three identical micro-satellites. Launched in March of 2006, ST5 was a NASA New Millennium Program mission designed to test innovative hardware and software technologies. ROME was an integral part of the ST5 MOC, assessing and managing three constrained resources (memory management, power management, and RF signal