An Innovative Process-Based Mission Management System for Unmanned Vehicles

This paper presents the design study developed to realize an innovative mission management system that can be installed onboard different unmanned vehicles. The main aim of the project is the standardization of system processes by employing a modular architecture, that can be adopted for several mission profiles. The activity focus is set on the system components design in order to assess specific processing applications. So, after the identification of common processes among platforms, traditional onboard functions can be implemented, such as Guidance, Navigation and Control (GN&C). This innovative system architecture is characterized by a “core” section, that includes the processing units, and a “custom” section, that involves specific vehicle devices, such as sensors, antennas, and actuators. Considering the modular approach, the optimized design must be selected for each of these units, allowing easier onboard installation and systems exchange. Assessing the specific inputs and combining the “core” processes it is possible to realize synthetic functions that reconstruct the traditional functions outputs. The main advantages of the proposed solution are the increase of the mission management system reliability level and the reduction of costs, thanks to the adoption of same “core” section for different kinds of transport platforms and the employment of Micro Electro-Mechanical System devices.