ESA Open Invitation to Tender: 1-10896
Open Date: 18/08/2021 14:41 CEST
Closing Date: 13/10/2021 13:00 CEST

Currently extensive mission preparation / mission customisation (“missionisation”) activities are required for each specific launch trajectory. This approach is costly and each launch can take place only within a narrow set of conditions (e.g. wind) risking postponement, increasing cost even further.Using a more aircraft like approach with guidance and control preparation according to flight envelope not per trajectory, while increasing operational availability and safety early in the development process is essential to achieve the benefits of recurrent space transportation flight. Such an approach requires adoption of robust control techniques, providing explicit consideration of uncertainties, with formal guarantees by design, allowing mission preparation and Verification validation (VV) efforts to be reduced while increasing the resilience to wind conditions.In addition, the same robust control formulation makes it possible to automatically design and validate a family of controllers that fulfill the requirements not only for one single mission, but for a pre-specified set of missions (e.g. with different target orbits and payload masses). This capability represents a paradigm shift in mission customisation, where one can select the most adequate controller from a pre-designed family, and automatically tune it while checking that the proposed mission is within the limits of its usable domain.Finally, recent advances in commercial model-based engineering software tools can also contribute to a more systematic handling of requirements, and thus faster cycles of design, analysis and VV.This activity encompasses the following tasks:- Development of a model-based engineering framework with agile management of requirements;- Investigation of robust control synthesis approaches enabling an automated mission customisation;- Application of robust control analysis techniques enabling faster and more reliable VV cycles.The approach developed will be demonstrated on a suitable realistic scenario, demonstrating benefits over the full life cycle.

Estabilishment: ESTEC
ECOS Required: Yes
Classified: No
Price Range: 200-500 KEURO
Authorised Contact Person: Maxime Nicolas Gislain Guy
Initiating Service: TEC-SAG
IP Measure: N/A
Prog. Reference: E/0901-01 – Technology Developme
Tender Type: Open Competition
Open To Tenderers From: AT+BE+CH+CZ+DE+DK+EE+EL+ES+FI+FR+GB+HU+IE+IT+LU+NL+NO+PL+PT+RO+SE
Technology Keywords: 5-B-IV-Competitive AOCS Technologies
Products Keywords: 1-H-1-d-Other