THE EVOLUTION OF DIGITAL ENGINEERING: FUTURE VISIONS FOR GNC MODEL-BASED DESIGN

This paper offers a vision of how digital engineering, including the careful use of artificial intelligence (AI), can meet the increased future expectations of higher autonomy, capability, and complexity in space systems, including Guidance, Navigation, and Control (GNC). The paper discusses how digital engineering, incorporating a model-centric design approach, has the potential to increase both engineering efficiency and mission performance, and presents the current state of digital engineering adoption and common limitations. A roadmap for the future, which addresses these limitations, is explored. Within the digital engineering landscape, the paper also tackles the role of adaptive systems and AI, which are slowly but surely creeping into our industry, and explores which applications are best suited for their adoption in the immediate future and beyond.