Grid Enabled Ground Segment Systems

Distributed architectures, commonly adopted by ground segment systems in order to cope with the large amounts of data and intensive computing associated with space missions, are now facing new scenarios with increasing data rates, larger archives and added-value services that call for the investigation of technologies capable of supporting these requirements. This paper reviews the features provided by grid technologies and how they qualitatively fulfil the requirements applicable to ground segment systems. It explains how, the integration of grid technologies into the ground segment systems, introduces important benefits related to features available from the grid framework, as well as architectural and software engineering advantages. The ideas presented in this paper are supported by a case study in the domain of the Spacecraft Control Operations System 2000 (SCOS-2000) and its ancillary systems. This case study tackles the challenge of integrating grid technologies into ground segment systems, defining an integration model that aims at providing a unique portal for the provision of ground segment services