Mitigating Challenges of the Space Environment for Onboard Artificial Intelligence: Design Overview of the Imaging Payload on SpIRIT
This addresses the problem of limited data transmission and harsh environments for space-based AI applications, though it is incremental as it builds on existing nanosatellite and edge computing technologies.
The paper tackles the challenge of enabling AI and autonomous computing on nanosatellites by designing a hardware and software system called Loris for onboard computer vision, which includes cameras and a GPU to handle data processing and compression in space conditions.
Artificial intelligence (AI) and autonomous edge computing in space are emerging areas of interest to augment capabilities of nanosatellites, where modern sensors generate orders of magnitude more data than can typically be transmitted to mission control. Here, we present the hardware and software design of an onboard AI subsystem hosted on SpIRIT. The system is optimised for on-board computer vision experiments based on visible light and long wave infrared cameras. This paper highlights the key design choices made to maximise the robustness of the system in harsh space conditions, and their motivation relative to key mission requirements, such as limited compute resources, resilience to cosmic radiation, extreme temperature variations, distribution shifts, and very low transmission bandwidths. The payload, called Loris, consists of six visible light cameras, three infrared cameras, a camera control board and a Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) system-on-module. Loris enables the execution of AI models with on-orbit fine-tuning as well as a next-generation image compression algorithm, including progressive coding. This innovative approach not only enhances the data processing capabilities of nanosatellites but also lays the groundwork for broader applications to remote sensing from space.