Near Earth Asteroid Scout CubeSat Science Data Retrieval Optimization Using Onboard Data Analysis

Small spacecraft are continually evolving in capability and mission complexity. As spacecraft size decreases, physical limitations present new challenges for mission designers. These include limited instrument aperture, low communications bandwidth, and reduced attitude control. Software techniques can address these limitations to retain the capabilities of larger spacecraft, in a small form factor. These techniques move the first order science analysis, which is traditionally completed on the ground, onboard the spacecraft. This can minimize the amount of data volume required for first order decision making. We present a collection of techniques designed for mitigating limited pointing stability for target acquisition, onboard image calibration and decision making, in a low bandwidth environment. These technologies will fly on the Near Earth Asteroid Scout (NEA Scout) interplanetary CubeSat mission in 2019 [1]. To support verification and validation, the flight software implementations of these algorithms have been run on New Horizons, Rosetta and terrestrially acquired data sets. These experiments validate the capability to detect the target, through noise and target location uncertainty.