Christian M. Fuchs

• PhD (Interdisciplinary); MSc (Space Engineering + CE); BScE (IT Security)
• CEO/Founder at Fox2Space

In this contribution we present practical experiences from realizing a prototype of the first truly fault-tolerant and autonomously operating avionics suite for miniaturized satellite down to the size of a 2U CubeSat. Our initial demonstrator setup consists of a mix of COTS parts and FPGA development boards, which we gradually expanded in scope and...

Miniaturized satellites enable a variety space missions which were in the past infeasible, impractical or uneconomical with traditionally-designed heavier spacecraft. Especially CubeSats can be launched and manufactured rapidly at low cost from commercial components, even in academic environments. However, due to their low reliability and brief lif...

Miniaturized satellites are currently not considered suitable for critical, high-priority, and complex multi-phased missions, due to their low reliability. As hardware-side fault tolerance (FT) solutions designed for larger spacecraft can not be adopted aboard very small satellites due to budget, energy, and size constraints, we developed a hybrid...

In this contribution, we present a CubeSat-compatible on-board computer (OBC) architecture that offers strong fault tolerance to enable the use of such spacecraft in critical and long-term missions. We describe in detail the design of our OBC's breadboard setup, and document its composition from the component-level, all the way down to the software...

We present the implementation of a fault-tolerant MPSoC for very small satellites (<100kg) based upon commercial components and library IP. This MPSoC is the result of a co-design process and is designed as ideal platform for software-implemented fault-tolerance measures. It enforces strong isolation between processors, and combines fault-tolerance...

Context. Protostellar multiplicity is common at all stages and mass ranges. However, the factors that determine the multiplicity of protostellar systems have not been systematically characterized through their molecular gas. Aims. We characterize the physical properties of the Perseus molecular cloud at ≥5000 AU scales by mapping the diagnostic mol...

There are valuable satellites that fail early and almost none have been repaired or investigated. Other industries benefit from feedback loops that use failure analysis to accelerate design and manufacturing improvements. 17 Historically the cost of a repair mission would be so high it wouldn't be considered. The cost of space debris mitigation mis...

Protostellar multiplicity is common at all stages and mass ranges. However, the factors that determine the multiplicity of protostellar systems have not been systematically characterized through their molecular gas. Nobeyama 45m Radio Observatory OTF maps of HCN, HNC, HCO$^+$, and N$_2$H$^+$ (J = 1--0) toward five subregions in Perseus, complemente...

Forthcoming

We developed the first truly fault-tolerant and autonomously operating, decentralized satellite backbone and avionics suite for miniaturized satellites down to the size of 2U CubeSats. We developed this technology from the ground up: the idea for this technology emerged, when the first CubeSat we worked on as students failed on-orbit. This idea is...

Fault-tolerant system architectures for space applications are currently validated using system-level testing. This is viable for systems relying on hardware measures, but unsuitable for fault tolerance (FT) implemented in software. Fault injection using a realistic test-setup is considered good practice to validate software, but also challenging....

Miniaturized satellites are currently not considered suitable for critical, high-priority, and complex multi-phased missions, due to their low reliability. As hardware-side fault tolerance (FT) solutions designed for larger spacecraft can not be adopted aboard very small satellites due to budget, energy, and size constraints, we developed a hybrid...

In this contribution, we provide insights on the practical feasibility, effectiveness, and validation of a software-based fault-tolerance architecture we developed for use aboard small satellites. We exploit thread-level coarse-grain lockstep to facilitate forward-error-correction and assures computational correctness on an FPGA-based MPSoC. It can...

(Poster) In this contribution, we provide insights on the practical feasibility, effectiveness, and validation of a software-based fault-tolerance architecture we developed for use aboard small satellites. We exploit thread-level coarse-grain lockstep to facilitate forward-error-correction and assures computational correctness on an FPGA-based MPSo...

This paper proposes a LEO relay constellation formed by a ring of nanosatellites utilizing S-Band for data relay and UHF/VHF and S-Band for user communication. It is feasible with existing CubeSat hardware, and provides communication relay links to satellites from 495km to 850 km of altitude. By providing service to nanosatellites with a CubeSat-ba...

Modern embedded and mobile-market processor technology is a cornerstone of miniaturized satellite design. This type of lighter, cheaper, and rapidly developed spacecraft has enabled a variety of new commercial and scientific missions. However micro- and nanosatellites (<100kg) currently are not considered suitable for critical, high-priority, and c...

Micro- and nanosatellites have become popular platforms for a variety of commercial and scientific applications, but today are considered suitable mainly for short and low-priority space missions due to their low reliability. In part, this can be attributed to their reliance upon cheap, low-feature size, COTS components originally designed for embe...

Modern embedded technology is a driving factor in satellite miniaturization, contributing to a massive boom in satellite launches and a rapidly evolving new space industry. Miniaturized satellites however suffer from low reliability, as traditional hardware-based fault-tolerance (FT) concepts are ineffective for on-board computers (OBCs) utilizing...

Micro- and nanosatellites have become popular platforms for a variety of scientific applications, but are constrained to short and low-priority missions due to their reliability. In part, this can be attributed to their reliance upon cheap, highly-scaled, consumer-grade on-board computer (OBC) components. Most recent miniaturized satellites utilize...

Modern embedded technology is a driving factor in satellite miniaturization, contributing to a massive boom in satellite launches and a rapidly evolving new space industry. Miniaturized satellites, however, suffer from low reliability, as traditional hardware-based fault-tolerance (FT) concepts are ineffective for on-board computers (OBCs) utilizin...

Modern embedded technology is a driving factor in satellite miniaturization, contributing to a massive boom in satellite launches and a rapidly evolving new space industry. Miniaturized satellites however suffer from low reliability, as traditional hardware-based fault-tolerance (FT) concepts are ineffective for on-board computers (OBCs) utilizing...

Despite being versatile and efficient for various use cases, nano-and microsatellites are still plagued by low dependability. The low survivability of many earlier CubeSat missions can be attributed, among others, to low component level failure tolerance and a lack of FDIR functionality. Most nanosatellite developers underestimate the required test...

We present storage integrity concepts developed for the CubeSat MOVE-II over the past two years, enabling dependable computing without relying solely upon hardened special purpose hardware. Neither component level, nor hardware-or software-side measures individually can guarantee sufficient system consistency with modern highly scaled components. I...

Context. Historically, due to instrumental limitations and a lack of disk detections, the structure of the transition from the envelope to the rotationally supported disk has been poorly studied. This is now possible with ALMA through observations of CO isotopologues and tracers of freezeout. Class 0 sources are ideal for such studies given their a...

Due to instrumental limitations and a lack of disk detections, the structure between the envelope and the rotationally supported disk has been poorly studied. This is now possible with ALMA through observations of CO isotopologs and tracers of freezeout. Class 0 sources are ideal for such studies given their almost intact envelope and young disk. T...

Future spacemissions will require vast amounts of data to be stored and processed aboard spacecraft. While satisfying operational mission requirements, storage systems must guarantee data integrity and recover damaged data throughout the mission. NAND-flash memories have become popular for space-borne high performance mass memory scenarios, though...

This paper presents the on-orbit results and the lessons learned from First-MOVE (Munich Orbital Verification Experiment), the first CubeSat mission of the Institute of Astronautics (LRT) at the Technische Universität München (TUM). The development of the satellite started as a student project in 2006. First-MOVE was launched on November 21st 2013....

A satellite’s on-board computer must guarantee integrity and recover degraded or damaged data over the entire duration of the spacecraft’s mission in an extreme, radiated environment. While redundancy and hardware-side voting can protect Magnetoresistive RAM well from device failure, more sophisticated software-side storage concepts are required if...

http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2509743