A rapid, flexible approach to tradespace definition and exploration

This paper provides an overview of the Mission Tradespace Tool (MTT), a methodology and software framework developed to improve JPL´s early design process by offering a rapid, structured, and inexpensive way to identify feasible space mission design architectures from a wide array of candidate architectures. There has been a growing consensus at JPL that to improve the quality of service offered to design customers it is desirable to explore a wide tradespace of candidate architectures prior to forming a conceptual design baseline. This paper describes the rationale behind the MTT´s approach to meet this need. Notable features of the framework are introduced and explained