Software on a NASA spacecraft recently made a scientific observation on its own without human interaction. The Space Technology 6 Autonomous Sciencecraft Experiment captured images of Antarctica's Mount Erebus and detected volcanic activity.

The software, developed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., controls the Earth Observing-1 spacecraft. NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md, manages the satellite. The software examines pictures from the Hyperion spectrometer, an instrument highly sensitive to heat released from molten lava.

After taking an image of Erebus, the software detected heat from the lava lake at the summit of the volcano and reprogrammed the camera to take more pictures. News of the detection was rapidly transmitted to scientists. Typically, it could take months to learn a remote volcano was active and scientists normally would need to take measurements at the volcano to detect the same type of event. Researchers at JPL and Goddard will test the Autonomous Sciencecraft Experiment on Erebus and other volcanoes for the next several months.

"Autonomous Sciencecraft is a giant leap toward a thinking spacecraft," said Dr. Steve Chien, JPL senior technologist for the software. "The software is the first use of autonomy allowing the spacecraft to make decisions without waiting for commands from scientists. It can capture short-lived science events that otherwise would have been missed."

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