Acquisition Tracking and Pointing Technologies

ATA proposes to develop, test and deliver an Optical Inertial Reference Unit (OIRU) called the MSTAR Inertial Reference Unit with DRGs (MIRU-D). The MIRU-D will incorporate four ATA ARS-14s and four Boeing MEMS DRGs on the inertially stable side of the MIRU-D. The efforts in Phase II will lay the groundwork for a unit that is both technically superior and ready for flight qualification and manufacturing, with many of the proposed components having flight heritage. The MIRU-D prototype EDU design is flexible and scalable. ATA sees potential for reducing the size of the MIRU-D mechanism to make it viable for smaller airborne platforms such as UAVs, helicopters, and tactical fighter aircraft. ATA currently produces a smaller angular rate sensor (ARS-15) that could be incorporated in the current design for significant cost savings, lower SWaP, with just a slight degradation in performance. ATA is also developing a new state-of-the-art angular rate sensor (ARS-16) that has performance better than the current ARS-14 with a size similar to the ARS-15. The ARS-16 along with the quartz DRG under development at Boeing would result in an inertial sensor suite of significant smaller size with equivalent or better performance.