Extended Reality for Space and Astronautical Engineering Applications

Extended Reality (XR) technologies are rapidly emerging as transformative tools in space and astronautical applications. This research explores the integration of XR techniques in astrodynamics and space system engineering, focusing on their application to large-scale space infrastructure operation and maintenance, scientific experiments inside space stations, and immersive visualization of different mission scenarios. Indeed, the complexity of such applications, involving orbital dynamics and mission design, is crucial for mission planning. To address this, we propose a Virtual Reality (VR)-based design and development which enables users to interactively engage with mission scenarios and which provides an immersive visualization and simulation platform to support manned or unmanned activities. Three use cases have been selected to evaluate it, the first one focuses on mission scenarios for outreach and simulation, the second one is about human operation inside the International Space Station; and the third one addresses the simulation and operational planning of a Planetary Sunshade System., i.e. a very large-scale infrastructure designed as a space-based geoengineering solution to mitigate climate change. In particular, this last one is a system composed of a swarm of solar sail satellites that are partially, or even totally, assembled in space, and it is positioned at the Sun-Earth-Moon photo-gravitational L1 equilibrium point to reduce a portion of the oncoming solar radiation on Earth. This work contributes to the broader domain of technologies that enable space systems engineering by demonstrating how XR can bridge the gap between conceptual design and real-world implementation of innovative and near-future space technologies.