Advanced Engineering Services

Metis specializes in flight dynamics design for High Earth Orbit, cislunar, lunar, and planetary missions operating in gravitational environments and operational regimes far more complex than conventional LEO or GEO missions. Our team supports mission development from early concept formulation through flight operations and end-of-mission disposal, with expertise in mission orbit design, transfer trajectory analysis, orbit determination, navigation, long-duration propagation, and operations for spacecraft affected by multi-body dynamics, lunar resonances, challenging long-term orbital behavior, and navigation in complex gravitational environments. Recent accomplishments include developing and operating NASA’s ACS3 Advanced Composite Solar Sail System Flite/FDS Lite flight data system, automating orbit determination solutions, OEM generation, solar-sail attitude modeling, ephemeris prediction, reporting, and CARA uploads. In support of cislunar orbital mechanics, Metis maintains and applies prototyping tools for relative motion in eccentric, high-altitude orbits.

Additional Metis experience includes leading flight dynamics activities for the Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer mission, creating an unprecedented equatorial lunar orbit for the Dark Ages Radio Experiment mission, and proposing innovative lunar-resonant orbit solutions for X-ray spectroscopy on the Arcus mission and in-situ solar plasma studies on HelioSwarm.

Metis collaborates with NASA to analyze and customize orbit characteristics for mission requirements, focusing on swarms of interacting spacecraft. Key achievements include developing mission simulations for multi-spacecraft swarms, leading flight dynamics and mission operations for the Starling swarm mission and optimizing HelioSwarm orbits to reduce maximum separations while addressing communication limitations. These capabilities enhance swarm coordination, relative motion modeling in perturbed environments, and overall mission efficiency for complex space operations.

Metis collaborates with NASA to design, analyze, and operate missions involving swarms of interacting spacecraft, where mission success depends on the performance of the distributed system through coordinated formation evolution, maneuver execution, and multi-spacecraft operations. On NASA’s HelioSwarm mission, Metis personnel support the design and analysis of a multi-spacecraft heliophysics observatory using co-orbiting SmallSats in a lunar-resonant High Earth Orbit, including relative-motion design for the distributed swarm, assessment of transfer and science-orbit options, swarm reconfiguration planning, and analysis of how spacecraft spacing, communications architecture, propellant use, and long-term orbital behavior affect mission performance. Metis has developed mission simulations for multi-spacecraft swarms and led flight dynamics and mission operations for NASA’s Starling swarm mission, strengthening capabilities in swarm coordination, relative-motion modeling, and operations in perturbed orbital environments. As distributed multi-spacecraft missions become more common and cislunar traffic increases, Metis is also evaluating long-term swarm dispersion, conjunction assessment, space situational awareness considerations, and decommissioning options that support NASA’s “trackable until demise” expectations.

Metis’ personnel provided systems administration, systems engineering, network engineering and software engineering to support USAF ground system development and sustaining engineering.

Metis made significant improvements to MMSOC v. 2.0 software architecture, including development of core MPS Command Builder code which needed to be modified to support critical launch activities; development of a modular design for the User Desktop which allows for additional products to be easily added to the drop-down menu; and development of scripts to automate CM processes saving numerous program labor hours.

Metis supports systems administration, engineering, network, and software support to NASA Ames’ MMOC for cost-effective, reconfigurable resources across multiple missions. We coordinate customer needs, plan upgrades, and ensure NASA compliance for projects including Starling, BioSentinel, VIPER lunar rover, IRIS solar imaging spectrograph, and Astrobee robotic free-flyers. Our modular infrastructure management covers networks, security backups, monitoring via Nagios/Splunk, and tools like Confluence/Jira/MatterMost, enabling yearly authorization for agile multi-mission operations in low-Earth orbit, lunar, and heliophysics environments.

Metis sustains software for NASA’s Space and Near-Earth Networks for telemetry, tracking, commanding, data downlink, and radiometric services in on-orbit operations. At Wallops, our software engineers develop and maintain ground systems and scheduling software for operations and sustainment. At White Sands, we provide ground station integration and test, IT administration, cybersecurity, and system upgrades, enhancing network reliability and security, and DTE scheduling operations.

Metis provides network operations support to NASA’s DSN, delivering expertise in infrastructure, project interfaces, mission planning, critical event planning and training for Network Operations Administrators and Network Operations Project Engineers . Key achievements include supporting critical missions like Voyager high-power uplinks, Europa Clipper, Artemis and Artemis 2, and HERA; 24/7 operational support for critical mission, deploying software upgrades; conducting anomaly investigations, root cause analyses, and innovations for telemetry retries. These capabilities minimize downtime, optimize performance metrics, and ensure reliable deep space communications for maximized mission data return.

Metis supports AFRL’s Space Vehicles Directorate and NASA Ames across CubeSat life cycles, from concept through launch and operations, including TechEdSat missions for re-entry experiments and radiation shielding demos. We develop formation flight requirements, ConOps, ADCS integration, simulation code for attitude control and orbit determination, mechanical designs for TES-19 folding heat shields, latching mechanisms, TPS components, and trade studies on radiation detectors, shielding materials, and sun sensors. Our propulsion and systems engineering includes requirements, performance evaluations, product selection, innovative concepts like hosted payloads and DESPINA X-Ray PNT sensors, with integrations, environmental testing, and collaborations for missions across multiple TES vehicles.

Metis engineers supported NASA’s SPHERES and Astrobee robotic free-flyers on the ISS, providing integration, testing of ground and flight units, in-flight operations, and ground data system management. We managed hardware prototyping in NASA Ames’ small satellite lab, including SPHERES propulsion system replacement and return to flight. For Astrobee, we supported hardware/software integration and Safety Data Packages while advancing positioning algorithm development  with collaborative SLAM, sensor fusion, and autonomous mapping validated with real ISS data and hardware prototypes.