Step 1 for the DSP Astronautics Project

1st blog post for this Project

As I am joining the group a little late, I have little catching up to do. Before I get into the details of the stuff I have done, I want to thank my group Robert, Luke, Melina, Beyonia, Deon, Matias, and Konrad for being so very helpful.

"Mission to Neptune Final Report"

Since this simulation is going to be based on the "Mission to Neptune Final Report", my first task was to read through and pick out relevant pieces of information. the report primarily contained details of the whole mission and the relevant technologies that the probe will have to have to complete its tasks. Below I have summarized the aspects of the report that our group will have to be aware of and/or focus on.

Primary Objective of the probe

- The probe will travel through the solar system from Earth to Neptune where it will potentially fall into the atmosphere of Neptune collecting data. Here I will only mention what the probe will do as this is what we might be using in our simulation.

• Visible Imaging. Take high resolution pics
• Thermal Mapping of the planet surface. Also should be high resolution
• Measure density, scale height, temperature, composition, and compositional mapping of the surface to determine the features of Neptune (look at the different colors/ shads of Neptune)
• Measure Magnetic fields and magnetosphere particles at various latitudes and longitudes. ( crudely stating this would be trying to determine the rotation of Neptune at different locations in the planet. Some parts of Neptune could be moving at different speeds).

Secondary Objectives of the probe

- Investigate the moon Triton. Measure size and structure of the atmosphere. (using radio IR and UV)
- Investigate the rings of Neptune. Imagine of the arcs. (detection of various wavelengths)

Question / Concerns from reading the Report

- How accurate do we want our simulation to be? In the report it was mentioned that this project will take place during a planetary alignment period.
- Traveling through the solar system might be boring. All the prob's tasks are near Neptune so what will the probe do till then in this simulation.
- Realistically Neptune will be really dark, how do we want to light it up in the simulation.

The probe already has a set route, so navigation is not the priority. Collecting data is the priority, and there are many different kinds of data collection form visible imaging to thermal. which ones will we incorporate in the simulation. Also the report mentioned a probe package that will travel into the atmosphere of Neptune to collect data (the report concluded that this was not possible without technological advances)

Simulation Game's educational component

The group has looked into the available simulation games so as to not redo what has already been done I looked into the educational aspect of the simulation games. In our case the main question will be what do we want to teach the students from our simulation. Also this simulation has to be a marketing tool for the relevant department (it has to be cool). Here are some of my thoughts on what we can use for this project as the player controlled features with respect to it being educational.

• Using different imaging, like IR and visible to get different information
• Some information collection will depend on where the information is taken. (compositional mapping, will need data from different locations in Neptune. if the locations are too close, it will not achieve the objective )
• possibly using the tools meant for Neptune on other planets on the way???

Using Oculus in Unity

Robert has already looked into this but I felt that I should also be familiar with using Oculus in Unity.(we have more or less decided on doing this on unity using Oculus). Simply dropping the Oculus camera prefab into the environment in unity will enable the environment to be viewed though the Oculus. Just to spice it up we can add the player controls prefab to this camera to enable movement of the Oculus camera. Then we can move around using the keyboard and look around our environment. Something I notice was that in moving around there must be proper lighting, else the shadows might obstruct visibility.

Simulation Ideas

• the most basic one will be to travel to Neptune and collect data on prompt. An audio narration will give instructions and explanations. failure to collect data on prompt will lead the mission to failed message.
• since the probe is on a set path, we can have the Oculus be the camera controlled by mission control. The narration will give information and instructions, the player will have to try and execute them. for example the instruction will say take a pic of Neptune in the visible range or IR then the player will have to change the settings of the instruments and take the relevant pic. If the pic does not include the planet or is in a different settings mode, the mission fails.
• if we take this simulation another step further we can have the player look at neptune differently when settings are changed. for example when the setting is IR the player will look at an IR version of Neptune.
• more advanced version of this simulation will have the probe falling through the atmosphere of Neptune, during which time data must be collected quickly.

Summary of Tasks this week

- read the Mission to Neptune Final Report and get relevant information.
- look into simulation games.
- familiarize myself with using Oculus in Unity.
- come up with simulation ideas for the group.