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Active TRL 4 (started at 4, targeting 8)
Future exploration missions to Mars will have increased need for crew autonomy. Crew Health & Performance (CHP) related data on the ISS is currently downlinked manually and is in disparate locations, which limits crew autonomy for future missions. The CHP-IDSP project is developing a backend data system platform that grants the ability to seamlessly collect, store, process, and display CHP-related data for exploration missions. This platform allows for integration of data and advanced analytics that offer crew and ground teams better insight into the crew’s health and performance. It also enables applications that can improve the crew’s ability to provide more autonomous medical care during exploration missions. Data will be collected automatically to reduce crew and ground team time and effort and will synchronize across all in-mission vehicles, habitats, and ground as communication delay permits.
The Human Research Program’s (HRP) Medical Data Architecture (MDA) project focused on this backend data architecture but for medical data only. The CHP-IDSP project, a joint effort between the HRP and the Mars Campaign Office (MCO) Exploration Medical Integrated Product Team (XMIPT), expands this capability to all relevant CHP-related data. The additional inputs from nutrition, environment, exercise, radiation, and any other relevant sources will give more insight into crew’s health and performance. Currently, the Human Systems Engineering and Integration Division at Johnson Space Center (JSC) is designing the system. The team completed a system requirements review (SRR) in FY22 and now the focus is on core software development, testbed buildup, and use case scenario demonstration. CHP-IDSP completed an end-to-end software demonstration with multiple data sources across CHP domains at the end of FY24. Following this ground demo, the project is working on building additional software functionality and integrating with devices and other applications like the Exploration Electronic Health Record (xEHR). The project will culminate in a flight technical demonstration on the ISS in future years.
By providing crew and remote personnel the core capabilities needed for timely and meaningful data insights across CHP domains, CHP-IDSP enables increased autonomy for crew to overcome the many hurdles associated with exploration missions. The ability to access CHP data in real time facilitates increased situational awareness and decreases ground decision support reliance by crew to effectively respond to emergencies and anomalies. With each new integration with a CHP data source, crew gets even more insight into their own health and environment.
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