Development of an EUVE Virtual Environment (EVE) System for Satellite Anomaly Resolution and Science Planning in Operations

Abstract

This paper discusses the design and development of the EUVE Virtual Environment (EVE) system. The EVE system is being developed as an interactive virtual reality (VR) viewing tool for NASA's Extreme Ultraviolet Explorer (EUVE) satellite. EVE will serve as a predictive tool for forecasting spacecraft constraint violations and will provide a capability for spacecraft problem analysis and resolution in realtime through visualization of the problem components in the spacecraft. EVE will animate, in three-dimensional realtime, the spacecraft dynamics and thermal characteristics of the EUVE spacecraft. EVE will also display the field of view for the science instrument detectors, star trackers, sun sensors, and both the omni and high-gain antennas for NASA's Tracking and Data Relay Satellite System (TDRSS) and for possible ground station contact. EVE will display other vital spacecraft information to support the routine operations of the EUVE spacecraft. The EVE system will provide three quick-look visualization functions: (1) to model in-orbit data for realtime spacecraft problem analysis and resolution, (2) to playback data for post-pass data analysis, and training exercises, and (3) to simulate data in the science planning process for optimum attitude determination and to predict spacecraft and thermal constraint violations. We present our preliminary design for a telemetry server, providing both realtime and post pass data, that uses standard Unix utilities. We also present possibilities for future integration of the EVE system with other software to automate the science planning and command generation functions of the satellite operations.