1. REVEAL Instrument Overview What is REVEAL? Prototype strap-down (vehicle-independent) instrumentation system REVEAL provides the traditional (manned) airborne laboratory support items –data acquisition and distribution, state parameters, recording, and networking infrastructure, but with far less size, weight and power than previous systems –Self-contained with internal sensors (inertial reference system, GPS, instrument- grade accelerometer and clinometer), heater, GPS splitter, UPS, and power/temp/pressure/humidity monitoring, –Also has external interfaces for analog, serial, video, and avionics buses. –REVEAL on Altair leverages Iridium satellite connectivity so that geographically distributed researchers can maintain situational awareness of vehicle and instrument states in near realtime. Built on open standards; dynamically reconfigurable; designed for broad class of sensor web and airborne instrument communication R&D applications.

2. REVEAL Instrument Overview Why is REVEAL? A vehicle-independent interface for UAV-based science instruments is valuable –Cost reduction Eliminate needless repetition of data & comm interface engineering –Risk mitigation Reduce need for integrated instrument and vehicle C3I data link –Weight, volume, power constraints We need to evolve better capabilities and greater capacity to do useful work on UAVs –REVEAL helps evolve network-centric approaches to payload integration, command, control, monitoring, etc.

3. REVEAL Instrument Overview The future of exploration & observation Is a network-centric, layered, complex system-of-systems. start building the suborbital layer! Why?

4. REVEAL Instrument Overview

5. Nominal Use Case Scenario Vehicle Systems Experiment 1 Experiment 2 Experiment 3 Research Group 1 Research Group 3 Research Group 2 Aircraft Wireless Network (e.g. Iridium) (Future)

6. REVEAL Instrument Overview Tele-control Tele-observation Network Computing Prototype an end-to-end capability OTH Connectivity Instrument Interaction On-board computing resource Web Access NAS A Use Case Scenario (detail)

7. REVEAL Instrument Overview