Technology Infusion for the Next Generation Real Time Mission Monitor

The NASA Real Time Mission Monitor (RTMM) is a visualization and information system that fuses multiple Earth science data sources to enable real time decision-making for airborne and ground validation experiments. Developed at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Marshall Space Flight Center, RTMM is a situational awareness, decision-support system that integrates real time aircraft positions, satellite imagery, radar, surface and airborne instrument data sets, model output parameters, lightning location observations, soundings, satellite and other applicable Earth science data sets. The integration, delivery and display of this information is made possible through data acquisition systems, network communication links, network server resources and the Google Earth application for the end user visualization display. In its early form, RTMM proved valuable in supporting the aircraft operations of individual NASA Earth science field experiments. RTMM was developed and evolved in a piecemeal fashion as a result of being funded by several individual field projects each with their own mission-specific requirements. As its capabilities improved and the visualization application moved from a two dimensional viewer to the 3D virtual globe, flight planners, mission scientists, instrument scientists and program managers alike learned to appreciate the contributions that the RTMM made to their specific needs (e.g., NASA African Monsoon Multidisciplinary Analyses (NAMMA 2006), Tropical Composition, Cloud, and Climate Coupling (TC4 2007), and Arctic Research of the Composition of the Troposphere from Aircraft and Satellites (ARCTAS 2008) and the Soil Moisture Active Passive Validation Experiment (SMAP VEX 2008). In order to improve the usefulness and efficiency of the RTMM system, capabilities are needed to allow the end-user to configure RTMM applications based on their mission-specific requirements and objectives. The next generation RTMM is being redesigned to take advantage of the Google plug-in capabilities to run multiple applications in a web browser rather (see fig. 1) than the original single application Google Earth approach. Currently RTMM employs a limited Service Oriented Architecture approach to enable discovery of mission specific resources. We are expanding the RTMM architecture such that it will more effectively utilize the Open Geospatial Consortium Sensor Web Enablement services and other new technology software tools and components. These modifications and extensions will result in a robust, versatile RTMM system that will greatly increase flexibility of the user to choose which science data sets and applications to view. Through these improvements the RTMM system will continue to provide mission planners and airborne scientists with decision-making tools that can be used more efficiently plan, prepare and execute missions. To paraphrase the old television commercial “RTMM doesn't make the airborne science, it makes the airborne science easier.”