Media Contact:
Jim Ong
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

The U.S. government’s satellite control network is comprised of more than a dozen ground stations and hundreds of satellites that fly in geosynchronous, highly-elliptical, or low-earth orbits. These satellites support a wide variety of military and non-military missions, and their continuous operation is vital for national security.

Satellites must periodically exchange health and status data and commands with ground stations to ensure that they maintain their orbits and operate correctly. Currently, the Air Force relies on teams of planners to schedule these satellite-to-ground communication passes. When a ground station problem occurs, communication passes involving the faulty ground station must be quickly rescheduled and reassigned to new ground stations to meet mission deadlines. However, scheduling is complex because the times when communications can take place depend upon each satellite’s unique orbit and the type and location of each ground station. Communication time windows of low earth orbit satellites can last just ten or fifteen minutes as they quickly fly in and out of view of a ground station.

Under this contract, Stottler Henke will develop an advanced decision support system that generates optimized schedules for communication passes that satisfy these complex constraints. It will incorporate its proven Aurora scheduling engine to generate high- quality schedules. Under this contract, Stottler Henke will build upon new concepts it developed and prototyped during a successful phase 1 effort.

"Managing the Satellite Control Network efficiently is absolutely critical," says Dick Stottler, President of Stottler Henke. "The antennas on the ground are very expensive, and the space satellites they support are practically priceless. Squeezing the most out of limited resources is where Aurora really excels," continues Stottler.

Aurora is a sophisticated scheduling system that combines a variety of scheduling techniques, intelligent scheduling conflict resolution, and decision support to generate highly efficient solutions to complex problems. The software’s customizable scheduling algorithms take into account resource requirements, complex constraints, and pertinent domain knowledge. Aurora’s built-in capabilities and extensibility enable it to significantly outperform other scheduling systems that use generic heuristics to assign resources to tasks. The Boeing Company uses Aurora to manage the process of building the Boeing 787 Dreamliner™ commercial airliner, and NASA uses Aurora at Kennedy Space Center to schedule International Space Station payload and Shuttle processing activities. The United Space Alliance (USA) incorporated Aurora into Temporis, designed to schedule flight activities on board NASA’s next- generation manned spacecraft. Aurora was featured in NASA’s Hallmarks of Success video series that showcases successful spin-off technologies.

Founded in 1988, Stottler Henke Associates, Inc. applies artificial intelligence and other advanced software technologies to solve problems that defy solution using traditional approaches. The company delivers intelligent software solutions for education and training, planning and scheduling, knowledge management and discovery, decision support, and software development. In 2006, Stottler Henke was the subject of a NASA "Hallmarks of Success" video profile for its work developing and later commercializing advanced planning and training software systems. Stottler Henke received a 2004 "Brandon Hall Excellence in Learning" award for innovative technology. Stottler Henke was named one of the "top 100" companies making a significant impact on the military training industry by Military Training Technology magazine for 2009 and five previous years. In 2005, Stottler Henke received a Blue Ribbon, recognizing it as a company that leads the industry in innovation. Web: http://www.stottlerhenke.com.