I-HAMMER: Interactive Autonomy for Control of Space Assets

ABSTRACT: The United States is increasingly reliant on space-based technologies for surveillance, communications, and navigation. However, our satellites face significant threats from failures, space weather, and orbital debris and must become more survivable. A key component to more survivable satellite systems is on-board autonomy. However, autonomy faces challenges in trust from satellite operators. This proposal addresses this issue by developing an operator interface for autonomy software. This interface allows operators to interact with and understand the autonomous satellite system. Our system, called I-HAMMER, interacts with components including the Mission Planner, Threat Response Planner, and Executive. Each component has different responsibilities in the autonomy architecture and each interface is customized for those responsibilities. BENEFIT: Trusted autonomy will result in satellite systems that are more robust, responsive, and cheaper to operate. This will increase their usefulness to the warfighter and analyst while reducing their operations cost. A modular and extensible operator interface will increase the useability of satellite autonomy software. This will dramatically improve the economics, effectiveness and survivability of military satellites. Commercial applications of autonomy software include unmanned vehicles, oil exploration and production rigs, and NASA space missions.