HR: 0800h
AN: P11B-0549    [Abstracts]
TI: Planetary Radars Operating Centre PROC
AU: * Catallo, C
EM: claudio.catallo@thalesaleniaspace.com
AF: Thales Alenia Space Italia, Via Saccomuro 24, Rome, 00131, Italy
AU: Flamini, E
EM: enrico.flamini@asi.it
AF: Agenzia Spaziale Italiana (ASI), Viale Liegi 26, Rome, 00198, Italy
AU: Seu, R
AF: University of Rome "La Sapienza", INFOCOM Dept., Via Eudossiana 18, Rome, 00184, Italy
AU: Alberti, G
AF: Consorzio di Ricerca Sistemi Telesensori Avanzati, CO.RI.S.T.A., Viale Kennedy 5, Naples, 80125, Italy
AB: Planetary exploration by means of radar systems, mainly using Ground Penetrating Radars (GPR) plays an important role in Italy. Numerous scientific international space programs are currently carried out jointly with ESA and NASA by Italian Space Agency, the scientific community and the industry. Three important experiments under Italian leadership ( designed and manufactured by the Italian industry), provided by ASI either as contribution to ESA programs either within a NASA/ASI joint venture framework, are now operating: MARSIS on-board Mars Express, SHARAD on-board Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and CASSINI Radar on-board Cassini spacecraft. In order to support all the scientific communities, institutional customers and experiment teams operation three Italian dedicated operational centers have been realized, namely SHOC, (Sharad Operating Centre), MOC (Marsis Operating Center) and CASSINI PAD ( Processing Altimetry Data). Each center is dedicated to a single instrument management and control, data processing and distribution. Although they had been conceived to operate autonomously and independently one from each other, synergies and overlaps have been envisaged leading to the suggestion of a unified center, the Planetary Radar Processing Center (PROC). PROC is conceived in order to include the three operational centers, namely SHOC, MOC and CASSINI PAD, either from logistics point of view and from HW/SW capabilities point of view. The Planetary Radar Processing Center shall be conceived as the Italian support facility to the scientific community for on-going and future Italian planetary exploration programs. Therefore, scalability, easy use and management shall be the design drivers. The paper describes how PROC is designed and developed, to allow SHOC, MOC and CASSINI PAD to operate as before, and to offer improved functionalities to increase capabilities, mainly in terms of data exchange, comparison, interpretation and exploitation. Furthermore, in the frame of an operative experimental platform, where a specific payload ( to be developed by the Italian Industry) a GPR will be accommodated on-board the Italian Space Agency stratospheric balloon and the data analysed by PROC; as a minimum two flight campaigns over polar regions are foreseen. The system shall be capable of acquiring radar data upon scientists requests in order to help them refine their models, experiment new algorithms, improve data interpretation capabilities. The paper also describes how the system will be integrated in the PROC, sharing the operational resources and aiding scientists to increase their knowledge in the field of surface radar sounding. A specific PROC Web facility is foreseen to allow data gathering, request submission, data exchange and dissemination.
DE: 6225 Mars
DE: 6281 Titan
SC: Planetary Sciences [P]
MN: 2007 Fall Meeting