CSP-Based Interactive Decision Aid for Space Mission Planning

This paper describes an innovative application of AI technology in the area of space mission planning. A system called Mexar has been developed to synthesize spacecraft operational commands for the memory dumping problem of the ESA mission called Mars Express. The approach implemented in Mexar is centered on constraint satisfaction techniques enhanced with flexible user interaction modalities. This paper describes the effort in developing a complete application that models and solves a problem,and also offers functionalities to help users in interacting with different aspects of the problem. The paper surveys the design principles underlying the whole project and shows how different components contribute to the delivered system.