DFKI: Simulated Satellite Rendezvous

In their new Space Exploration Hall, the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI) can now carry out projects such as testing flight systems and studying the interactions between satellites and robots. The hall was opened at the DFKI Robotics Innovation Center (RIC) in Bremen, Germany, in November 2010. One current project is called Innovative Technologies for the Relative Navigation (Motion) and Capture of Mobile Autonomous Systems (INVERITAS for short), in which DFKI researchers are simulating the relative navigation of two satellites. The behavior of the satellites is first simulated by software and then performed by two motion systems with 1:1 models in the 10-meter-high hall.