MMAS The Multi-Mission Archive Server

In the last few years, the preservation of digital data has quickly become a pressing issue worldwide with both corporate and community entities. A challenge posing our generation is how to maintain and safely preserve the immense volume of information that we have accumulated as a global community. Digital information is an extremely valuable yet vulnerable resource that is easily mishandled, corrupted, deleted and lost. Exponential rates of technological evolution also render systems and files obsolete in a few years at best. The archiving and preservation of digital data is not unique to any particular industry. Institutions such as museums, national libraries, hospitals, public administration, research centres, educational institutions and media outlets, among others, are all searching for secure methods of long-term digital archiving. The space industry generates huge amounts of data in both the design & development of space hardware and even more so in the downlink of satellite GNC (Guidance Navigation and Control) and scientific data.

In an effort to expand our expertise in the area of long-term data archiving, Jotne EPM Technology began discussions with ESA specialists, experts in the data archiving industries and the Norwegian Space Centre. The result of these discussions is a contract to develop a standards based archive server for the storage of downlink data for multiple satellite missions.

Traditionally the data archives for a particular ESA (European Space Agency) mission have been handled on a per mission basis, with dedicated hardware and software specific to that mission. In common with other users of electronic archiving the rapid evolution of hardware and software means that there is a significant issue in preserving the stored data over the long term. The OAIS (Open Archival Information System) recommendation produced by the CCSDS (Consultative Committee for Space Data Systems) specifies a reference model that is intended to address the issues in long term preservation of data.

The purpose of the Multi-Mission Archive Project is to deploy the next generation of data sharing and open-standard methodologies to provide a fast-track prototype of the multi-mission archiving server to ESA. By utilizing open standards and web tools, this archiving server will demonstrate the concept of a long-term platform-independent repository which is accessible to necessary users.

What is required is to develop a space domain specific multi mission server adhering to the OAIS standards as much as practical. At the end of the project the goal is to deliver a prototype product to be used as a design basis supporting space and other industries. It is expected that the prototype will demonstrate the capability and confidence to proceed with a follow-up project for further development of an operational multi-mission archive server for ESA/ESOC. The technology will have multiple applications in the future in several market areas.

Jotne EPM Technology is proud to work with Mr. Nestor Peccia and ESA at the European Space Operations Centre in Darmstadt, Germany to develop this innovative standards-based archive capability.