The remote operations subsystem has three theaters of operation. The first theater is the borehole. The remote operations subsystem provides the computing hardware and software that will allow remote operational control of the equipment at the borehole. Since there are inadequate funds to fully automate the borehole equipment, human intervention in operating the equipment will likely be required. Therefore, the borehole operations will not be “in simulation”. The second theater is the Mission Operations Center , which will probably be located at the CAB in Madrid , Spain . The Mission Operations Center is responsible for:
1) Obtaining the science and operations data from the borehole.
2) Providing science data and mission status to the Science Operations Centers with realistic time delays.
3) Obtaining directives from the Science Operations Center in terms of how the equipment should operate.
4) Relaying the directives to the borehole so that they can be executed.
Since the borehole equipment is not in simulation, items 1 and 4 are also not in simulation. Therefore, the communications, and transfer of data and knowledge between the mission operations center and the Borehole equipment will not be restricted. However, items 2 and 3 both relate to communications with the science operations centers, which are in simulation. Therefore this communication must mimic a mission in a realistic way. That is, the data must be delayed with a realistic latency, and the type of information that is shared must be limited to the types of data that would be available on a robotic mission.
The third theater is the Science Operations Centers. We will have two science centers, one at the Center for Astrobiology in Madrid , and another at the Ames Research Center in Mountain View , California . The Science Operations Centers will receive data from the Missions Operations Center for scientific analysis. The science teams at these centers will make decisions about drill rate, subsampling, core disposal, and BHIS insertion. These decisions will be sent to the Mission Operations Center , which will then relay the directives to the borehole equipment. The Science Centers will try to make sense of the data that it is receiving and use it to characterize the shallow subsurface biosphere at the Rio Tinto. To enable this entire architecture, the remote operations subsystem will have computers and software located at the borehole for controlling the equipment. It will also have a data communications infrastructure for getting the data from the borehole to the mission operations center. Computers and software for user interfaces and data storage will also be necessary at the Mission and Science Operations center.
The mission simulation will be performed with a remote science teams located at operations centers in Madrid , and NASA Ames Research Center (near Mountain View, California). The drilling, sample handling, and instrument operations will be remotely controlled with mission-like realism. Communication between the drill site and the remote operations team will be via satellite telecommunications. The remote science team will have access to remote sensing data about the site which is comparable to that available for Mars from orbital data, and will analyze data from drill payload instruments, but will have no other knowledge of the site. The science team will be selected on the basis of brief “participating science” proposals submitted to the project solicited through a general announcement to the Mars/Astrobiology science community. Scientists will be expected to contribute written reports of their results, interpreted from the drilling data, that will be submitted to a refereed journal. The papers will be published in a special issue of Journal of Geophysical Research, comparable to that from a previous field experiment [ J.G.R. Vol. 106, E4, 2001]. Field operations of the simulated Mars drill will last for 1 month. Drilling, instrument operation, and data collection will simulate Mars flight-like conditions (e.g. command cycling, data volume restrictions).
