GMV at the heart of EU SST, first operational version of GMS

At the end of 2021, GMV was awarded two contracts by DLR for the development of its new product line for catalogue build-up and maintenance. The first was to develop a new astrodynamics library (called BaSSTDa) implementing the low-level algorithms used in the Space Surveillance and Tracking (SST) domain.

The purpose of the second contract was to develop, install, and integrate the civilian German Space Situational Awareness Center (GSSAC) Mission System (GMS). The main contribution of this system to the EU SST partnership is the build-up and maintenance of the space objects catalogue by processing SST data shared by the EU SST members. This catalogue is at the heart of the EU SST services, as it provides the space objects information (characteristics and orbital data) to the other services within the partnership (collision avoidance, fragmentation, and re-entry). We are proud to say that GMV is responsible for its complete development and operationalization.

The system includes all the software required for SST data processing, as well as databases and archives, system interfaces, and the framework responsible for orchestrating the process. It is made up of the following components: external interfaces handling, including data ingestion (external auxiliary data) and data sinks (generated by GMS); data processing software, as the core of the GMS responsible for building up and maintaining the object catalogue; orchestration and framework software responsible for controlling the flow of data across the different modules and for the overall orchestration (data ingestion, pre-processing, storage in databases and/or file system, etc.); portal software, a web-based graphical user interface to access all input and output data; product generation software and product submission software responsible for submitting products to internal and external users.

After two years of intense work, GMV implemented the first operational version in DLR. Its entry into operation is scheduled for the second quarter of 2024, once the validation and acceptance phase has been completed.