Spacecraft environmental anomalies expert system

An expert system has been developed by The Aerospace Corporation, Space and Environment Technology Center for use in the diagnosis of satellite anomalies caused by the space environment. The expert system is designed to determine the probable cause of an anomaly from the following candidates: surface charging, bulk charging, single-event effects, total radiation dose, and space-plasma effects. Such anomalies depend on the orbit of the satellite, the local plasma and radiation environment (which is highly variable), the satellite-exposure time, and the 'hardness' of the circuits and components in the satellite. The expert system is a rule-based system that uses the Texas Instrument's Personal Consultant Plus expert-system shell. The expert-system's knowledge base includes about 200 rules, as well as a number of data bases which contain information on spacecraft and their orbits, previous spacecraft anomalies, and the environment. (Author)