HEART (Habitat ECLSS Analytics for Resilience Tool) is an environmental health monitoring platform that addresses the need for autonomous technologies to manage space habitats. Spacecraft crew on deep space exploration missions will need to manage, plan, and execute a mission independently of mission control on Earth, because of communication time lags or outages. Due to complexity of spacecraft systems, operations management will be prohibitively time consuming and computationally intensive. Off-nominal events may occur that limit crew activity or capacity. Furthermore, space habitats like Lunar Gateway may operate without crew for weeks, months, or even years at a time, necessitating autonomous operations. When a space habitat is unoccupied, unexpected events may require immediate autonomous detection and response. HEART assesses ECLSS robustness in real time for autonomous habitat health management. It provides state estimation, model-based anomaly detection, prioritized anomaly reporting, and managed transitions to different operating modes (dormant, quiescent, and active) in space habitats like Lunar Gateway. The benefits of HEART over state-of-the-art ECLSS health management applications include improved situational awareness, model-based anomaly detection for dynamic systems, early degradation detection, risk assessment for prioritized reporting, state transition readiness, and adaptability. This Phase I project will show proof of concept for the enabling functions of HEART. In support of NASA’s priorities for sustained human exploration of deep space the HEART concept will be a major step towards autonomous systems that enable spacecraft operation independent of Earth-based mission control. The design will be readily transferable to terrestrial applications, including management of any complex controlled environment supporting life forms, such as submarines, plant growth chambers, greenhouses, or even biomanufacturing facilities.
HEART will be an asset for autonomous operations in space habitats envisioned by NASA for deep space exploration, such as Lunar Gateway, lunar surface habitats, Mars transit vehicles, or Mars surface habitats. HEART has the potential for infusion into the Advanced Exploration Systems program under the Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate (HEOMD) including the habitations systems and foundational systems domains, especially the Autonomous Systems and Operations project.
HEART can provide autonomous environmental health management for any complex controlled environment supporting life forms, including human spacecraft and space habitats, space suits, deep space diving suits, submarines, underwater habitats, smart greenhouses, or even microbial reactors used for bio manufacturing processes.