Final Year Project: Space Station Design
Who might find this page useful?
This is likely only useful for QMUL’s final year undergraduate students in who are taking EMS690U final year project under my supervision. It will make little to no sense for anyone else (inlcuding those from QMUL) as there will be a lot covered in the in-person workshops. This is merely to augment to that; it is not meant as a standalone piece.
Project Blurb (for Inspiration Only)
There is a rapidly growing number of man-made satellites in Earth’s orbit, fulfilling a wide range of tasks. As satellite technology develops, there is a growing interest in the design of satellites such as the International Space Station (ISS), that are capable of sustaining human occupation for extended periods. The design requirements of these occupied satellite systems are complex and depend upon the number of occupants, the expected duration of occupation (i.e. the number of years an astronaut would spend on the satellite) and the overarching purpose of the space station.
Each group will examine a different type of space station, which serves different purposes, including
- A habitat for long-term occupation
- A site for disaster-monitoring
- Persistent Earth observations
- Space-based astronomy
- In-space factory for production of semi-conductors
Students will focus on a single application from the above list and will consider different levels of human occupants, range from less than 10 to several thousand people. The specific objectives include determining precise system-level requirements, estimating costs associated with different possible designs, and developing an Attitude and Orbit Control System. Students will need to survey available launch vehicles (incl. SpaceX’s Starship Super Heavy) to develop cost estimates and a mission plan/architecture for the assembly. The latter will involve developing a high-level concept of operations needed to assemble the desired space station using either robots or astronauts. Again, a trade-off analysis is necessary as a precursor that estimates cost, speed, time, risks, etc. for each assembly style. By the end of the project, students will be expected to conclude with a recommendation on the station design, the chosen assembly architecture in the conops for their given occupancy limit, and orbit/attitude control system simulations.
Weekly Workshop Philosophy
In line with the formal assessments (listed below) but also to prepare you as future leaders in engineering, our weekly 2-hour workshops are geared primarily towards getting you to developing broader skills than university might typically prepare you for in the early years. Some examples of skills you will develop over the coming weeks are listed below (but this is by no means an exhaustive list):
- Public Speaking: elevator pitch style in the early weeks to eventually being able to give rapid updates in the later weeks.
- Writing: Developing writing skills.
- Insight Generation: Reflecting on technologies here I do not just mean space technolgoies but even those that you use in preparing your reports such as Github and \(\LaTeX\) and the underlying philosophy for their development.
Informal Assessments
Thus, we have the following two informal assessments:
- Weekly in-class presentaitons by each member of every group the entire academic year.
- 6-page technical report to be submitted in Week 6 of Semester B.
Formal Assessments
| Assessment | Due Date |
|---|---|
| Assessment 1: Front End Individual Design Report (10%) | [Due Date] |
| Assessment 2: Group Project Proposal/Feasibility Study (10%) | [Due Date] |
| Assessment 3: Peer Evaluation with Self Reflection and Action Plan Sem A (0%, Formative) | [Due Date] |
| Assessment 4: Peer Evaluation with Self Reflection and Action Plan Sem B (15%) | [Due Date] |
| Assessment 5: Individual Detailed Design Report (40%) | [Due Date] |
| Assessment 6: Final Group Presentation and Individual Back-up Evidence (15% Group, 10% Individual) | [Due Date] |
Useful Resources:
This list will grow but useful resources at the time of writing are:
Writing:
- \(\LaTeX\) template on Overleaf that I have posted.