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Telerobotics Concept Paper Version Concept Paper Concerning Space Data System Standards TELEROBOTICS March 2013 CONCEPT PAPER CONCERNING SPACE DATA SYSTEM STANDARDS: TELEROBOTICS CONTENTS Section Page 1 INTRODUCTION ......................................................................................................... 1-1 1.1 PURPOSE ............................................................................................................... 1-1 1.2 SCOPE .................................................................................................................... 1-1 1.3 REFERENCES ....................................................................................................... 1-1 2 TELEROBOTICS INTEROPERABILITY ....................................................................1 2.1 MOTIVATION AND NEED ......................................................................................2 2.2 APPROACH ...............................................................................................................3 2.3 BENEFITS ..................................................................................................................4 2.4 INCLUSION ...............................................................................................................4 2.5 MISSION APPLICATIONS .......................................................................................4 2.5.1 CSA .................................................................................................................5 2.5.2 DLR ................................................................................................................5 2.5.3 ESA .................................................................................................................6 2.5.4 NASA .............................................................................................................6 2.6 OPERATOR VENUES ...............................................................................................6 2.7 TESTING & PROTOTYPING ...................................................................................7 2.8 TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT ...........................................................................7 3 OTHER WORKING GROUPS ........................................................................................9 Page i October 2012 CONCEPT PAPER CONCERNING SPACE DATA SYSTEM STANDARDS: TELEROBOTICS 1 INTRODUCTION 1.1 PURPOSE This document is a Concept Paper for the Consultative Committee for Space Data Systems (CCSDS). CCSDS Concept Papers are working documents of the CCSDS, its Areas, and its Working Groups. Concept Papers have no official status, and are simply the vehicle by which technical suggestions are made visible to the CCSDS. They are valid for a maximum of nine months and may be updated, replaced, or rendered obsolete by other documents at any time. This Concept Paper is intended for consideration by the CCSDS Mission Operations and Information Management Area (MOIMS) as a brief statement of the technical scope of the proposed Working Group in Telerobotics. 1.2 SCOPE This concept paper describes the technical scope of MOIMS-TEL, a proposed Telerobotics Working Group within the Mission Operations and Information Management Area. It is the Charter of MOIMS-TEL to develop standards that support the safe, collaborative operation of mixed teams of human and robotic assets in the exploration of space. 1.3 REFERENCES The following documents are referenced in this Report. At the time of publication, the editions indicated were valid. All documents are subject to revision, and users of this Report are encouraged to investigate the possibility of applying the most recent editions of the documents indicated below. The CCSDS Secretariat maintains a register of currently valid CCSDS documents. [1] Rob Ambrose and Brian Wilcox, chairs. Robotics, Tele-Robotics and Autonomous Systems Roadmap: Technology Area 04. Washington, D.C.: National Aeronautics and Space Administration, April 2012. [2] International Space Exploration Coordination Group. The Global Exploration Roadmap. September 2011. [3] Yves Gonthier, et al., A Human-Robotic Partnership Assessment for the Global Exploration Strategy. Global Space Exploration Conference, Washington, DC. 2012. [4] CCSDS A20.0-Y-3, CCSDS Publications Manual (Yellow Book, December 2011). [5] CCSDS A02.1-Y-3, Organization and Processes for the Consultative Committee for Space Data Systems (Yellow Book, July 2011). Page 1-1 October 2012 CONCEPT PAPER CONCERNING SPACE DATA SYSTEM STANDARDS: TELEROBOTICS 2 TELEROBOTICS INTEROPERABILITY The proposed Telerobotics Working Group recognizes that the development of the component technologies required to extend human presence and capability into space is accelerating rapidly, and that there are emerging requirements for telerobotics interoperability and cross-support between International civil space agencies. A common framework for telerobotic operations would allow for diverse robotic assets to collaborate on mission goals and realize cost-savings from the cross-support provided by the participating Agencies. We will develop interoperability standards that are applicable to the widest possible cross- section of the telerobotics technology development and operations community. We are not developing an all-encompassing system for all robot communication, nor are we developing standards governing the development of telerobotics technology. Instead, we are developing the compatibility layer that will permit operators and robotic agents to freely exchange information, enabling operators to communicate with heterogeneous robots in a uniform fashion. The Telerobotics Working Group will develop a standards specification for software data structures and routines that simplifies the process of communicating between multiple diverse robots and their command and control systems. The specification will include three main elements: message formats, application programming interfaces (APIs) and functional descriptions of the application services that support supervisory telerobotics operations over near-Earth time delay. For instance, the specification may define a message format for describing the configuration of a robotic asset, the API for sending and receiving that message and a functional description of an application service that ensures that robots do not collide with each other or their human collaborators. We believe that the following areas of telerobotics technology development will benefit from knowledge of — and participation in — the development of a telerobotics interoperability standard, and we will endeavor to include these elements of the space robotics community in the standards process through outreach efforts: • Sensing and perception, which seeks new detectors, instruments and techniques for localization, proprioception, obstacle detection, object recognition and the processing of that data into a system’s perception of itself and its environment. • Mobility, which includes surface, subsurface, aerial and in-space locomotion, from small machines to large pressurized systems that can carry crew for long excursions, using modes of transport that include flying, walking, climbing, rolling, tunneling and thrusting. • Manipulation, which is focused on force control, compliance, eye-hand coordination, tactile control, dexterous manipulation, grasping, multi-arm control and tool use. • Autonomous systems, which seek to improve performance with a reduced burden on crew and ground support personnel, achieving safe and efficient control, and enabling decisions in complex and dynamic environments. Page 1 October 2012 CONCEPT PAPER CONCERNING SPACE DATA SYSTEM STANDARDS: TELEROBOTICS • Human-systems interface, which includes classical areas of telerobotics such as haptics and augmented reality with newer topics that include human safety, human- robot teams, crew decision support, interaction with the public, and supervision across the time delays of space. • Automated rendezvous and docking, which has focused on coupled sensing and range measurement systems for vehicle pose estimation across short and long ranges, relative navigation sensors for various constraints, autonomous GNC algorithms and implementation in flight software, integration and standardization of capabilities, docking mechanisms that mitigate impact loads that can increase allowable spacecraft structure and mass, and electric-fluid-atmospheric transfer across docked interfaces. • Systems engineering, which includes the required tolerance to environmental factors of vacuum, radiation, temperature, dust, and system level modular design philosophies that provide for interoperability and support international standards. In recognition that telerobotics technology is deployed to serve the larger mission goal, we also welcome participation from other domains, including: power; destination systems; information, modeling, and simulation; habitation; and communications technology. Each of these affiliated domains may be able to benefit from the knowledge that the telerobotic components of a mission system share a common status reporting format or state query mechanism. 2.1 MOTIVATION AND NEED Ongoing human missions to the International Space Station have an integrated mix of crew working with Intravehicular Activity (IVA) and Extravehicular Activity (EVA) robots and supporting autonomous systems on-board spacecraft and in mission control. Future exploration missions will further expand these human-robot partnerships. Robots,
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