VIMOS - Modular Commanding and Execution Framework for Onboard Remote Sensing Applications

Abstract

For decades, field help in case of disasters on the Earth’s surface - like floods, fires or earthquakes - is supported by the analysis of remotely sensed data. In recent years, the monitoring of vehicles, buildings or areas fraught with risk has become another major task for satellite-based crisis intervention. Since these scenarios are unforeseen and time-critical, they require a fast and well coordinated reaction. If useful information is extracted out of image data in realtime directly on board a spacecraft, the timespan between image acquisition and an appropriate reaction can be shortened significantly. Furthermore, on board image analysis allows data of minor interest, e.g. cloud-contaminated scenes, to be discarded and/or treated with lower priority, which leads to an optimized usage of storage and downlink capacity. This paper describes the modular application framework of VIMOS, an on board image processing experiment for remote sensing applications. Special focus will be on resource management, safety and modular commandability.