A Distributed Computing Approach to Mission Operations Support

Abstract

The ever-evolving nature of spacecraft Support operations requires computing systems which can adapt to dynamic support requirements. These systems must exhibit a high degree of reliability, perform a wide spectrum of services, and be able to grow incrementally in response to demand. A distributed computing network is proposed as a system architecture displaying the desired attributes. The proposed system employs functional specialization of resources, featuring high performance scientific processing, real-time response, and interactive operations. Fundamental to the approach is the notion of process-to-process communication, which is effected through a high-bandwidth communications network. Both resource-sharing and load-sharing may be realized in the proposed system.