An Autonomy Software Testbed Simulation for Ocean Worlds Missions

One of NASA's goals is to identify and characterize potentially habitable environments in the Solar System and beyond. While the search for evidence of extant and extinct life, and conditions supporting life in the Solar System, has primarily focused on Mars, there is strong evidence that a number of outer solar system moons (e.g., Europa, Enceladus, and Titan) harbor subsurface oceans. These "ocean worlds" may be the best places to search for extant life beyond Earth. However, due to the extreme environmental conditions and communications constraints, current mission operations practice of pervasive ground control supervision will be unproductive, and substantially autonomous operations will be required. This paper provides an overview of an autonomy software testbed simulation facility, the Ocean Worlds Autonomy Testbed for Exploration Research and Simulation (OceanWATERS) that NASA Ames Research Center is developing to spur the development of such autonomous operation capabilities.