The latest Decadal Survey for Solar and Space Physics points to the need for swarm or constellation missions, and NASA’s Starling mission is leading the way. NASA Starling is a technology demonstration to investigate constellation mission design, including cooperation between elements, or nodes, of a constellation. Funded by NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate (STMD), Starling consists of a cooperative group of four spacecraft to demonstrate multipoint science data collection in a swarm.
Starling is designed to test four capabilities: 1) Swarm maneuver planning and execution, 2) Communications networking, 3) Relative navigation, and 4) Autonomous coordination between spacecraft. These capabilities are made possible using four new technologies matured through this mission.
- Reconfiguration and Orbit Maintenance Experiments Onboard (ROMEO): ROMEO will demonstrate execution of swarm maintenance maneuvers from onboard the spacecraft, without ground intervention.
- Mobile Ad-hoc Network (MANET): The nodes communicate with each other via two-way S-band crosslink radios/antennas, adapting a ground-based network design. If one spacecraft cannot communicate, routes automatically reconfigure with the remaining operational swarm of spacecraft.
- Starling Formation-Flying Optical Experiment (StarFOX): Using commercial star trackers, each spacecraft determines its own orientation relative to the stars. The star trackers also visually detect and track the other three spacecraft to measure relative-position knowledge.
- Distributed Spacecraft Autonomy (DSA): This experiment will demonstrate autonomous monitoring of Earth’s ionosphere. Onboard software autonomously coordinates selection of the best measurement across all Starling spacecraft. All nodes in the constellation share and compare measurements to determine which has the best signal.
If you have a test case for the mission, the Starling mission operators are actively looking for input on testing this constellation system, contact the team with the following email: nathaniel.a.benz@nasa.gov or jeremy.d.frank@nasa.gov.