Architecting Space Systems

摘要

This paper describes current research in a new process for architecting space systems. It has been observed that traditional systems architecting processes tend not to be followed in practice. Research shows that a single point solution is determined very early, long before the implications of this decision are fully discovered, and the solution is only abandoned when it becomes impossible to implement.rnThis research sets forth an alternative process that provides designers with sets of potentially novel, optimised architectures on which to focus. The process emphasises placing team effort on problem understanding and formulation, versus brainstorming designs within a prematurely constrained architecture. An important step involves representing space architectures as major functions rather than specific forms, allowing brainstorming of the "whats" versus the "hows."rnThis paper presents the major steps in the process, applied to a distributed satellite swarm for measuring the ionosphere. Simulation results are also presented.