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14 April/May 2018 | Unmanned Systems Technology Airbus and IBM have developed an autonomous assistant for the German Aerospace Centre (DLR) to be used on the International Space Station (ISS), writes Nick Flaherty. CIMON (Crew Interactive MObile CompanioN) is a mobile and autonomous assistance system designed to aid astronauts with their everyday tasks. The Japanese Space Agency has previously developed a similar system called the Internal Ball Camera (see UST issue 15, August/September 2017), but CIMON will be the first use of AI on an ISS mission. CIMON uses IBM’s Watson AI system back on Earth to display procedures and offer solutions to problems via a large screen. The technology demonstrator, which is the size of a medicine ball and weighs 5 kg, will be tested on the ISS by astronaut Alexander Gerst during the European Space Agency’s Horizons mission between June and October 2018. It was built with metal and plastic parts created using additive manufacturing and 3D printing. The guidance, navigation and control algorithms will be tested under zero- g conditions in a parabolic flight ahead of the Horizon launch. “CIMON will be the first AI-based mission and flight assistance system,” said Manfred Jaumann, head of microgravity payloads at Airbus. “We are the first company in Europe to carry a free flyer to the ISS and to develop AI for the crew on board the space station.” A team of 50 engineers from Airbus, DLR, IBM and the Ludwig-Maximilians- Universität Munich, worked on the system, which learns to orientate itself and move around, as well as recognise the human astronauts on the ISS. The Watson AI was trained using voice samples and photos of Gerst, as well as procedures and plans of the Columbus module of the ISS. After the first mission, the researchers plan to use the CIMON project to examine group effects that can develop over a long period of time in small teams, for example during long-term missions to Mars. CIMON could also find future use in autonomous systems for hospitals and social care. The Watson AI has already been used as part of the Olli autonomous bus design. AI makes its space debut Space systems CIMON is designed to assist ISS astronauts with their everyday tasks We are the first company in Europe to carry a free flyer to the ISS and to develop AI for the crew on board the space station