NAIF Report Addresses both NAIF Node and SPICE Development

Navigation and Ancillary Information Facility

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NAIF Report

Addresses both NAIF Node and SPICE Development

PDSMCAugust 28, 2012

SPICE components are not restricted under ITAR


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Archive Status

Mars OdysseyCassiniMER RoversMROMESSENGERNew HorizonsMars Express (ESA)Venus Express (ESA)Rosetta (ESA)LROEPOXIDAWNGRAILMSLJunoLADEEMAVENOSIRIS-REx

ApolloVoyagerMagellanGalileoNEAR

Phobos-Grunt (RSA)

Good shape

• NAIF can make a Phoenix archive; the project didn’t.• AMES did not complete its LCROSS deliveries; NAIF can probably patch together enough to complete the job.

• JPL has previously refused travel needed to complete this effort. Doing it could help set the stage for good archiving on Luna-Resurs, ExoMars, etc.

• Assorted issues that we’ll deal with.

PhoenixLCROSS


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NAIF Node Summary - 1

• SPICE data archiving is in pretty good shape– Usually encounter problems with archives not produced at JPL– Occasionally we find a problem of our own– Catching up with old missions continues to be a problem; never

enough time.• User consulting continues to be a big part of NAIF staff

daily work• New prime and backup servers soon to come on-line• Still need to complete our local effort to allow GEO to serve

as the NAIF backup site


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NAIF Node Summary - 2

• SPICE Training– The last SPICE training class was in April, near Madrid

» Had 36 very happy students!– The next domestic class will probably be scheduled for

around February or March 2013– Have begun preparing a new set of tutorials for the

beginner’s class» Leaner, easier…» Not sure how this will work out…

– No work so far on tutorials for a future advanced class


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NAIF Transition to PDS4

• Plan to do a largely automated transformation of all archived SPICE data to PDS4 standards when PDS4 is stable and ready for ingest

– Will correct a few current issues at the same time• Biggest challenge is to update the SPICE Archive

Guide and allied tools for use by LADEE– But don’t need this delivered to them until ~ 4 months after launch,

which as of now is approximately Dec 01, 2013.– NAIF will make the PDS4 SPICE archive for MAVEN and ORX, so no

time-critical drivers there.• As of now NAIF has participated in a bit of design

work with PDS4 groups but has done no implementation work

• The tools we will implement are:– an update to our label-making tool, MKLABEL– updates to our archive assembly scripts

• Recent loss of a team member won’t help any


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SPICE and IPDA

• As for the PDS, the IPDA recommends use of SPICE, but its use is not a requirement

• Some on the IPDA proposed a continuation of last year’s “Geometry Project”

– But NAIF recommends further geometry-related work simply take place under the PDS4 umbrella, at whatever time PDS4 wishes to deal with this topic

– Acton drafted a “Geometry White Paper” for the IPDA that could provide some context for such work


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SPICE Development Summary - 1

• Major focus is STILL producing the N65 SPICE Toolkit– Due out in April (maybe Nov or Dec?)– Contents:

» New “geometry finder” functions» New high-level observation geometry routines» Important augmentations to some utility programs» New SPK and CK data types (one of each) to handle

eventual problems with some large archive collections» Additional Icy (IDL) and Mice (MATLAB) routines» Lots of smaller items» Some bug fixes» Better performance in some cases

• WebGeocalc development is ongoing– Hope to have an alpha-test release sometime this Fall


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SPICE Development Summary - 2• Other SPICE development work

– Java Native Interface (JNI) Toolkit» Alpha-test version is already being used by several groups» Currently on hold due to the below

– New shape models» Digital terrain model

• Major focus of work at present, with the SMAP earth science mission as prime driver, but with other (planetary) users also interested.

» Tessellated plate model (on hold)• Alpha-test version already used or in use on Hayabusa, DAWN,

Rosetta, MEX and PhSRM

Phobos ItokawaVesta


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• The Planetary Ephemeris Working Group of IAU Commission IV has adopted SPICE as its standard, primarily to facilitate comparisons of the planet ephemerides produced by NASA (JPL), France (Observatoire de Paris) and Russia (Institute of Applied Astronomy)

– Some of the development needed to accommodate this is done» New SPK data types and new time systems

– There has been some talk of eventually including satellite, comet and asteroid ephemerides

» Maybe we’ll learn more after the IAU General Assembly this week in Beijing


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• As a follow-on to the very good Planetary Data Workshop hosted by USGS in Flagstaff, NAIF, folks from USGS, and one person from Ames had a long telecon covering numerous SPICE-related topics

– Pointed out many requests for extensions to SPICE, most of which are likely difficult or worse

– More discussions to follow (Maybe more work, too???)• Also had a telecon with Showalter regarding

“OOPS” and SPICE– When we get a breather we’d like to look at his approach for

big performance improvements in geometry calculations to see if there are ideas there for SPICE

• Partly as a result of the above, we’re thinking a bit more about establishing some sort of “open source” SPICE tools/approaches repository


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Flight Projects Summary - 1

• Ongoing SPICE operations for NASA flight projects are generally going well

– Odyssey, MER, MRO, EPOXI, Cassini, Dawn, LRO, Messenger, New Horizons, Juno, MSL, GRAIL

– Need to finish some work for MSL• Upcoming NASA missions set to use SPICE are:

– MAVEN, SMAP (earth science), OSIRIS-Rex, and now even LADEE• Archive production by missions is generally going

well

NASA Flight Projects(not funded by PDS)


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Flight Projects Summary - 2

• ESA– MEX, VEX, Rosetta SPICE archives are trickling in– BepiColombo and Solar Orbiter seem very likely to use SPICE– ExoMars and JUICE are TBD, but seem likely to do so.

• ISRO– Supposedly has written to NASA asking for more SPICE training in

support of their 2013 Mars mission• RSA

– Apparently plan to use SPICE on Luna-Resurs, and presumably will want to use it on ExoMars.

» NAIF would propose to NASA, if a SALMON or similar opportunity opens up

• JAXA– Unclear as to future SPICE use, but some use seems likely given past

experience• China

International Flight Projects(A mixed bag of funding)


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NAIF Team Status

• Our newest member, hired just over a year ago, has recently left NAIF to go to work for Cassini

• It appears we’ll not have enough total funding to replace her

The SPICE Boys


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Anticipated Support from all Sources

FlightProjectOps.(31%)

PDS NAIF Node(32%)

AMMOS(1%)

Total NAIF FY13 Funding

CoreSPICE

Development(36%)

CASMER

ODY

DAWN

MROJuno

MESSMSL

EPOXIMEX

ROSETTA

GRUNT

SMAP

MAVENNH

GRAIL ORX

FY13 Flight Project Operations Contributions

FY13 FY14 FY15 FY16 FY17High estimate: 4.9 4.2 4.4 4.0 3.5Low estimate: 4.6 3.9 4.1 3.6 3.2

Workforce Supported(Lots of if’s and’s and but’s)

Documents

NAIF Report Addresses both NAIF Node and SPICE Development