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Senior Engineer receives Exceptional Software Award for Copernicus
September 23, 2009
: Odyssey Space Research, L.L.C. senior engineer Juan Senent, was part of a NASA Johnson Space Center (JSC) team awarded the JSC Exceptional Software Award for Software of the Year. JSC Director, Michael Coats, and JSC Engineering Director, Steve Altemus, presented the award for the development of the Copernicus Trajectory Analysis and Mission Planning software. Copernicus is the JSC candidate for the 2009 NASA-wide software of the year award. Dr. Senent is a critical member of the Copernicus team.
hTV Successfully Captured at ISS
September 17-18, 2009
: The Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency’s (JAXA) first H-2 Transfer Vehicle (HTV), was successfully captured and berthed to the International Space Station (ISS). While in free-flight, the HTV performed several prescribed demonstrations requiring coordination between JAXA and NASA engineering & operations teams; these demonstrations were done to gain confidence in the safety of the HTV’s rendezvous and proximity operations systems before performing the final approach to ISS. Upon successfully fulfilling all demonstration objectives, the HTV was given the “GO” to fly under automatic control to its designated capture point beneath the Japanese Experiment Module (JEM), Kibo, and to be captured using the Canadian Space Agency’s (CSA) Space Station Remote Manipulator System (SSRMS). Capture occurred on Sept 17 at 19:51 GMT, and berthing to the nadir Node-2 Common Berthing Mechanism (CBM) was completed on Sept. 18 at 01:49 GMT. Congratulations to the entire JAXA, CSA and NASA teams! For more information go to: http://www.jaxa.jp/countdown/h2bf1/index_e.html.
Lead Engineer awarded NASA Distinguished Public Service Medal
April 16, 2009
: Odyssey Space Research, L.L.C. lead engineer Brian Rishikof was presented with the Distinguished Public Service Medal by Acting NASA Administrator Christopher Scolese. The Distinguished Public Service Medal is the highest honor NASA confers on non-government employees. For more information, go to: http://nasapeople.nasa.gov/awards/nasamedals.htm.
NASA ATV RSWG Team receives SFA Flight Safety Award
June 23, 2009
: Odyssey Space Research, L.L.C. engineers Ron Flanary, Keshia Leach, Scott Piggott, DeAnn Sanders, and Brian Rishikof, were part of a 15-member NASA Johnson Space Center (JSC) team awarded the NASA Space Flight Awareness (SFA) Flight Safety Award for 2009. This national level award was conferred to the Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) Rendezvous Safety Working Group (RSWG) for leadership and support of the safe flight and integration of the European Space Agency’s first ATV mission to the International Space Station (ISS). Odyssey’s participation focused on engineering analysis and assessment and included the role of co-chair of the group. For more information, go to: http://sfa.nasa.gov/sfaawards.cfm#flightSafety.
SpaceX Awarded Commercial Resupply Services (CRS) Contract
December 22, 2008
: SpaceX was awarded the Commercial Resupply Services (CRS) contract with 12 flights of their Dragon vehicle to resupply the International Space Station (ISS). This fixed-price indefinite delivery, indefinite quantity contract started January 1, 2009, and is effective through December 31, 2016. Dragon development that started with demonstration missions now evolves into continuous mission support with supplying various internal and external payloads to the ISS. Odyssey Space Research L.L.C. is proud to be part of the SpaceX team to provide these services to NASA. Odyssey will continue to support SpaceX with systems engineering, robotics, general ISS integration, and cargo integration support. For more information go to: http://www.spacex.com.
Odyssey Part of Winning BAH APAC Team
December 12, 2008
: Odyssey entered into a subcontract agreement as part of the winning Booz Allen Hamilton (BAH) Advanced Planning Assessment Contract (APAC) team. Under this subcontract, Odyssey has the opportunity to provide independent programmatic and institutional capability support to the Johnson Space Center (JSC) Advanced Planning Office.
Odyssey Awarded 2008 Phase 1 SBIR
November 24, 2008
: Odyssey Space Research, L.L.C. was awarded a Phase I SBIR (Small Business Innovative Research) contract for the “Evolution of the ‘Trick’ Dynamic Software Executive and Model Libraries for Reusable Flight Software.” The objective is to develop tools that produce highly reconfigurable flight software allowing for the same software development environment to be used across the entire life cycle of a project. For more information, go to: http://sbir.gsfc.nasa.gov/SBIR/abstracts/08/sbir/phase1/SBIR-08-1-S4.04-8809.html.Successful End To ATV-1 "Jules Verne" Mission
September 29, 2008
: Odyssey Space Research, L.L.C. congratulates the European Space Agency (ESA) on a successful first Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) mission. Known as “Jules Verne,” ATV-1 successfully re-entered the atmosphere today after undocking from the International Space Station (ISS) on September 5th. Future ATV flights are currently in the planning and development stages, with ATV-2 anticipated to occur in approximately 18 months. For more information go to: http://www.esa.int/esaMI/ATV/index.html.
Odyssey Engineer Awarded SFA Honoree Award
August 6, 2008
: Odyssey Space Research, L.L.C., engineer, DeAnn Sanders, received the Space Flight Awareness Honoree Award for outstanding engineering achievements in support of the NASA Johnson Space Center (JSC) Engineering Directorate, Aeroscience and Flight Mechanics Division, for her work ensuring the safe flight of the Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) to the International Space Station (ISS). For more information, go to: http://sfa.nasa.gov/sfaawards.cfm#honoree.
ATV-1 Docks to International Space Station
April 3, 2008
: The European Space Agency’s first Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV), known as “Jules Verne,” has successfully docked to the International Space Station (ISS). While in free-flight, ATV-1 performed several days of demonstrations requiring coordination between ESA, NASA, and Russian engineering & operations teams; these demonstrations were done to gain confidence in the safety of the ATV’s rendezvous and proximity operations systems before performing the final approach to ISS. Upon successfully fulfilling all demonstration objectives, the ATV was given the “GO” to fly under automatic control to dock to the aft port of “Zvezda”, the ISS Service Module. Jules Verne’s docking probe was captured by Zvezda at 14:45 GMT, and docking was completed at 14:52 GMT. Congratulations to the entire ESA team! For more information go to: http://www.esa.int/esaMI/ATV/index.html.
Lunar Lander Design Study Announcement
March 17, 2008
: NASA has awarded contracts for independent evaluation of NASA’s current in-house design concept for a lunar lander. Odyssey Space Research, L.L.C. is proud to be the recipient of one of these contracts. The recommendations from this design study will be used by NASA to increase the technical maturity of the lunar lander design in preparation for vehicle requirements development. For more information, go to the NASA press release: NASA Altair BAA Selection.
Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) Demonstration Announcement
February 19, 2008
: NASA has announced the results of the Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) contract re-award competition. Odyssey Space Research, L.L.C. is proud to be part of the winning Orbital Sciences Corporation team. For more information on Orbital Sciences and the “Cygnus” COTS vehicle, go to: http://www.orbital.com.
AAS/AIAA Space Flight Mechanics Meeting
January 27-31, 2008
: Two Odyssey Space Research, L.L.C. (OSR) engineers, Kevin Choi, Ph.D. and Blair Thompson, Ph.D., have presented their research at the 2008 AAS/AIAA Space Flight Mechanics Meeting in Galveston, Texas.The first paper, “Adaptive Measurement Covariance for Multi-Input Kalman Filter-based Spacecraft Navigation” by Choi and Thompson (paper AAS 08-110), was a preliminary study into using all available redundant sensor measurements. Normally, data is selected from only one of a suite of identical sensors, while good data from the other functioning sensors is ignored. The presented study indicates improved performance may be achieved by incorporating the good data from the redundant sensors.
The second paper, “Validation of Gravity Acceleration and Torque Algorithms for Astrodynamics” by Thompson, fellow Odyssey engineer David Hammen, and others (paper AAS 08-205), presented the technique developed to validate the spherical harmonic gravity acceleration and torque algorithms of the Johnson Space Center Engineering Orbital Dynamics (JEOD) simulation software. The technique can be applied to the validation of any general spherical harmonic gravity algorithm use for astrodynamics engineering or space mission operations, and is not restricted to Earth gravity algorithms.
Odyssey Space Research, L.L.C. congratulates these engineers for a successful conference and a job well done.
NEPTEC USA
January 16, 2008
: NEPTEC USA has awarded a subcontract to Odyssey Space Research, L.L.C. to provide support on a small business technology research and planning project.
Commercial Space Tourism Project Collaboration Announcement
December 3, 2007
: Odyssey Space Research, L.L.C. and the Aerospace Research and Technology Center (CTAE, Centre Tecnològic per a la Indústria Aeronàutica i de l´Espai) are participating in a commercial space tourism project. Barcelona, Spain-based CTAE is a non-profit, private foundation that provides technology services in the aerospace sector. Odyssey and CTAE are performing a technology assessment for a Spanish business venture seeking to develop a habitable Earth-orbiting destination for private customers. Odyssey, teamed with CTAE and other companies on this project, is providing expertise in orbital and mission analysis. For more information on CTAE, visit: http://www.ctae.org.
Odyssey Awarded 2007 Phase 1 SBIR
November 16, 2007
: Odyssey Space Research, L.L.C. was awarded a Phase I SBIR (Small Business Innovative Research) contract for development of a “Wiki-Based Data and Information Integration (WikiDI2) System.” The WikiDI2 System is the only Wiki-based project management and team collaboration tool that provides site hosting services as well as installation packages to end-users for local implementation.
Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) Demonstration Announcement
October 2, 2006
: Odyssey Space Research, L.L.C. has joined the Rocketplane Kistler Inc. (RpK) Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) team. On August 18, 2006, RpK was named one of the two winning COTS teams by NASA. Odyssey’s role will include: systems engineering and design support; operations development; guidance, navigation and control (GN&C) simulation and analysis; and software verification and validation. For more information on Rocketplane Kistler, go to: http://www.rocketplane.com. UPDATEOctober 18, 2007
: NASA has announced the suspension of its COTS relationship with Rocketplane Kistler Inc.
Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV) Announcement
August 31, 2006
: NASA has announced the results of the “Orion” Crew Exploration Vehicle development contract competition. Odyssey Space Research, L.L.C. is proud to be part of the winning Lockheed Martin team supporting NASA’s Orion project. The Odyssey role will include support of the vehicle guidance, navigation, and control (GN&C), simulation development, and related analysis. For more on NASA’s Orion crew vehicle, go to: http://www.lockheedmartin.com/orion and http://www.nasa.gov.
Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) Demonstration Announcement
August 18, 2006
: NASA has announced the results of the Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) demonstration competition. Odyssey Space Research, L.L.C. is proud to be part of one of the two COTS winning teams: Space Exploration Technologies — or more commonly, SpaceX. Odyssey’s role will include support of the “Dragon” vehicle guidance, navigation, and control (GN&C) development, selected simulation and test-bed development, related analyses, systems engineering, and operations. For more information on SpaceX and the Dragon vehicle, go to: http://www.spacex.com.
Andrews Space Subcontract
October 17, 2005
: Andrews Space has awarded a subcontract to Odyssey Space Research, L.L.C. to perform guidance, navigation, and control (GN&C) design and analysis of the Human & Robotic Technology “Small Tug” technology demonstration spacecraft.
NASA Johnson Space Center (JSC) Aeroscience & Flight Mechanics Division
May 5, 2005
: Odyssey Space Research, L.L.C. was awarded a Prime Contract to support the NASA Johnson Space Center (JSC) Aeroscience and Flight Mechanics Division of the Engineering Directorate. This contract includes rendezvous, proximity operations, and capture analyses to support a variety of projects, such as free-flight integration of the International Space Station (ISS) visiting vehicles (the European Space Agency’s Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV), and the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency’s (JAXA) H-II Transfer Vehicle (HTV)), Constellation program-related simulation, analysis, and technology development, and other projects.
Odyssey Awarded Two Phase 1 SBIRs
January 21, 2005
: Odyssey Space Research, L.L.C. was awarded two Phase I SBIR (Small Business Innovative Research) contracts. One is to study “Automated Rendezvous and Docking Infrastructure to Support Commercial Space Development.” The other is to study “Fusion of Inertial Navigation and Imagery Data” for planetary navigation applications.
Silver Snoopy
November 21, 2004
: Two Odyssey Space Research, L.L.C. lead engineers, Brian Rishikof and David Strack, have been presented with Silver Snoopy awards by NASA astronaut Barry “Butch” Wilmore, under NASA’s Space Flight Awareness program. The Silver Snoopy is awarded by the astronaut office to fewer than 1 percent of the workforce for contributions to safety and mission success. For more information, go to: http://sfa.nasa.gov/sfaawards.cfm#snoopy.
MDA Houston Subcontract
October 4, 2004
: MDA Houston has awarded a subcontract to Odyssey Space Research, L.L.C. to provide simulation and analysis software for NASA in the rendezvous, proximity operations, and capture domain.
SAIC Subcontract
January 10, 2004
: SAIC has awarded a subcontract to Odyssey Space Research, L.L.C. for systems engineering support to NASA on the Orbital Space Plane (OSP) project. Odyssey’s role includes performing independent assessment of competing OSP designs for NASA in the GN&C and mission analysis areas.