Paper ID: 1b002 1 DISTRIBUTED OPERATIONS FOR THE CASSINI/HUYGENS

The Cassini project employs a concept known as distributed operations which allows independent instrument operations from diverse locations, provides full empowerment of all participants and maximizes use of limited resources. Science investigators and probe operators participate in the full range of operations from their home institutions. Each principal investigator (PI) is solely responsible for the design, construction, integration and flight operation of his or her own instrument, including mission planning, sequencing, instrument monitoring and science data acquisition, processing and analysis. Uplink and downlink processes have been developed expressly to support the distributed nature of the project. Each PI has been supplied with a Science Operations and Planning Computer (SOPC) to form a direct link between the center of operations at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and the PI’s own operational system. The SOPCs are designed to support each organization’s communication needs, including command generation and submission, real-time monitoring, telemetry retrieval and voice communications. 1