When plans are executed by mice and men

In human spaceflight mission operations, plans are executed by human flight controllers and crew.12 Execution of the plan requires initiation of activities, tracking their progress, verifying activity completion status, and determining how to react to unexpected events. The complexity of spaceflight operations requires the integration of information from many different sources to accomplish these tasks, and using many software tools to assist in the plan execution process. This paper provides a survey of the current state of the practice in helping NASA flight controllers execute plans. The paper then identifies technology gaps in the current tools, and provides a survey of near- and far-term work to provide flight controllers with improved tools for executing human spaceflight plans.

[1]  Jeremy Frank,et al.  Automation for Operations , 2008 .

[2]  Javier Barreiro,et al.  Peer-to-peer planning for space mission control , 2009, 2009 IEEE Aerospace conference.

[3]  David Kortenkamp,et al.  Developing and Executing Goal-Based, Adjustably Autonomous Procedures , 2007 .

[4]  D. Frank,et al.  The Challenge of Evolving Mission Operations Tools for Manned Space Flight , 2007 .

[5]  Rob Sherwood,et al.  ASPEN-Automated Planning and Scheduling for Space Mission Operation , 2000 .

[6]  A. Jónsson,et al.  Planning and Monitoring Solar Array Operations on the ISS , 2008 .

[7]  David Kortenkamp,et al.  Adjustable Autonomy with NASA Procedures , 2007 .

[8]  C. R. Weisbin,et al.  Autonomous Operations for the Crew Exploration Vehicle — Trade Study Design Considerations , 2005 .

[9]  David Kortenkamp,et al.  A Procedure Representation Language for Human Spaceflight Operations , 2007 .

[10]  G. Brat,et al.  Verification of Plans and Procedures , 2008, 2008 IEEE Aerospace Conference.

[11]  Maarten Sierhuis,et al.  NASA's OCA Mirroring System: An Application of Multiagent Systems in Mission Control , 2009, AAMAS 2009.

[12]  Jeremy Frank,et al.  Constraint-Based Attribute and Interval Planning , 2003, Constraints.

[13]  C.A. Cruzen,et al.  Autonomous Payload Operations Onboard the International Space Station , 2007, 2007 IEEE Aerospace Conference.

[14]  Paul Morris,et al.  Planning Applications for Three Mars Missions with Ensemble , 2007 .

[15]  David J. Korsmeyer,et al.  INTELLIGENT SYSTEMS FOR ADVANCED MISSION OPERATIONS , 2010 .

[16]  César Muñoz,et al.  A Formal Analysis Framework for PLEXIL , 2007 .

[17]  David Kortenkamp,et al.  Adjustable Automation for Lunar Habitat Control , 2008 .

[18]  G. Simon,et al.  XTCE: a standard XML-schema for describing mission operations databases , 2004, 2004 IEEE Aerospace Conference Proceedings (IEEE Cat. No.04TH8720).