Contingency Analysis for Low-thrust Missions (CALM)

In response to the 2023 NASA SBIR solicitation subtopic H9.03, ldquo;Flight Dynamics and Navigation Technologiesrdquo;, Advanced Space, LLC proposes to develop a mission design and planning tool that uses operational algorithms to mitigate the impact of anomalies and missed thrust events for low-thrust and dynamically sensitive missions. The software tool is an extension of the Virtual Swarm Method (VSM) for low-thrust trajectory optimization to maximize the missed-thrust recovery margin. The tool will be used to generate a multitude of spacecraft trajectories simultaneously to determine the worst-case scenarios to account for margins in the mission design. The results will provide trajectories, thrust arcs from failure modes, inform mass and propellant margins, and contribute to mission risk analysis. The proposed solution will be especially useful to future crewed Artemis missions to reduce mission risk more comprehensively. The proposed solution is named CALM or Contingency Analysis for Low-thrust Missions.nbsp;nbsp;Typical low-thrust spacecraft trajectory optimization consists of defining a nominal solution that obeys known constraints and minimizes the spacecraft propellant mass used. A major deficiency with these traditional methods is that it is difficult to incorporate missed thrust events, spacecraft failure modes, or other mission-specific anomalies in the mission planning phase. Experienced engineers use intuition and guesswork to manually arrive at solutions that are robust to failure modes, but this ad-hoc approach typically comes at the expense of the time it takes for trajectory optimization. There is no industry standard to account for anomalous activities or failure modes for low-thrust and dynamically sensitive missions. CALM aims to address this specific deficiency in the mission planning process.nbsp;