China has efficiently examined a home-grown working system in area, marking a significant step in direction of decreasing reliance on international software program and boosting the efficiency of future small satellites.
Greater than 1,000 hours of in-orbit testing had been performed aboard the Dalian-1 Lianli CubeSat to guage how satellite tv for pc subsystems carried out underneath the OpenHarmony real-time working system (RTOS) – a light-weight model of Huawei’s open-source operation platform, in line with a group of researchers from the Chinese language cities of Dalian and Xian.
With OpenHarmony, the suitcase-sized satellite tv for pc, which was launched from China’s Tiangong area station final yr, delivered quicker information updates and improved stability in contrast with earlier set-ups utilizing easier firmware or international software program, the researchers reported within the newest challenge of the journal House: Science and Know-how.
“The Lianli satellite tv for pc mission confirmed that utilizing the OpenHarmony real-time working system considerably improved the satellite tv for pc’s response pace and reliability,” Yu Xiaozhou, the paper’s lead writer and a professor at Dalian College of Know-how, advised Chinese language media in Could.
The Dalian-1 Lianli has been put in with the OpenHarmony real-time working system. Illustration: Handout
As the primary microsatellite to hold the OpenHarmony RTOS, Lianli additionally ran on a domestically produced chip, “reaching a completely home-grown hardware-software answer within the area, and providing a brand new possibility for spacecraft working methods worldwide”, in line with Chinese language media reviews.
Following the Lianli mission, Yu and colleagues proposed nationwide technical requirements to information how OpenHarmony is utilized in small satellites – a step supposed to encourage broader adoption, which is already happening throughout each business and analysis satellite tv for pc missions in China.