A commercial procedure execution engine completing the command chain of a university satellite simulation infrastructure

The Institute of Space Systems at the University of Stuttgart has a small satellite programme consisting of currently four missions. The first of these missions is the Flying Laptop, the purpose of which are technology evaluation, Earth observation and scientific measurement. Since the budget for a University satellite programme is obviously limited, engineering models of the entire spacecraft are to be avoided. In order to keep technical risks at a low level, a simulation based development approach was selected instead which already has been applied as proven technology in industry. The Institute of Space Systems applies the system simulation infrastructure Model-based Development and Verification Environment (MDVE) developed by Astrium as real-time simulator which is commanded via a SCOS-2000 mission control system. Easy commanding of such an entire simulated S/C, respectively, later the hardware in AIT phase, is mandatory especially for students only working with the equipment for a typical 6 months thesis period. Therefore the infrastructure setup was completed by the test procedure editor and execution engine Manufacturing and Operations Information System (MOIS) which for the first time provides a complete command/execution/control chain in the programme.