Starnav is a novel architecture for navigating anywhere in the solar system or beyond using the relativistic perturbation of starlight. The proposed starnav technique measures the change in inter-star…

This federal contract award is for the STARNAV project, a novel architecture for navigating through the solar system and beyond using the relativistic perturbation of starlight. The contract, valued at $96,807.26, was awarded to Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI), a private research university located in Troy, New York. The contract is a grant for research, with the goal of advancing the STARNAV technology from Technology Readiness Level (TRL) 1 to TRL 3. This work includes exploring the STARNAV sensor trade space and evaluating the technology within an aerospace architecture. The contract was awarded by the Shared Services Center, a civilian federal agency, and does not utilize any set-aside designation. RPI has a substantial portfolio of federal contract and grant awards, leveraging its expertise in areas such as advanced materials, biotechnology, computational science, and energy and the environment to support various government agencies and programs.

Starnav is a novel architecture for navigating anywhere in the solar system or beyond using the relativistic perturbation of starlight. The proposed starnav technique measures the change in inter-star angle due to stellar aberration to estimate vehicle velocity. These velocity estimates may be used for navigation. By converting the effect of stellar aberration from a nuisance parameter into.the navigation observable, starnav represents a significant departure from the conventional way that star sightings are used for navigation. The starnav architecture could benefit a wide array of proposed NASA missions, especially those operating at large distances from earth. The proposed work considers two such scenarios: (1) a flagship-scale exploration mission to neptune and (2) a mission to perform in situ exploration of the interstellar medium. The anticipated niac phase i activities include (1) exploration of the starnav sensor trade space and (2) evaluation of starnav.within an aerospace architecture. IT is impossible to complete either of these activities without the other. Our phase i efforts are expected to advance starnav from TRL 1 to TRL 3.