Space Object Environment Sensor Simulator

The overall aim of ESA’s Space Situational Awareness (SSA) Programme is to support the European independent utilisation of and access to space for research or services, providing timely and quality data and expertise regarding the environment, the threats and the sustainable exploitation of outer space. The objective of the SSA Sensor Simulator (SSIM) is to provide an environment for end-to-end validation of the future SSA system before its actual deployment. The SSIM reproduces physical models for all system elements involved in the data generation process: sensor planning constraints, orbit propagation of SST and NEO, radar measurement generation, ground based optical measurement generation and space based optical measurement generation.