Computer-Automated Evolution of an X-Band Antenna for NASA's Space Technology 5 Mission

TLDR

Current hand‑designed antenna development is time‑consuming and knowledge‑intensive, so evolutionary algorithms are employed to automatically discover more effective designs, and later orbital changes required updated antenna specifications. The study aims to use evolutionary algorithms to automatically design an X‑band antenna for NASA’s Space Technology 5 spacecraft. Two evolutionary algorithms—a real‑valued vector approach and a tree‑structured generative representation—were employed, with a fitness function adjustment enabling rapid evolution of new antennas within a month. The evolved antennas outperformed the hand‑designed counterpart; one design was fabricated, tested, approved, and deployed on all three ST5 spacecraft launched on March 22 2006, marking the first computer‑evolved antenna and hardware in space.

Abstract

Whereas the current practice of designing antennas by hand is severely limited because it is both time and labor intensive and requires a significant amount of domain knowledge, evolutionary algorithms can be used to search the design space and automatically find novel antenna designs that are more effective than would otherwise be developed. Here we present our work in using evolutionary algorithms to automatically design an X-band antenna for NASA's Space Technology 5 (ST5) spacecraft. Two evolutionary algorithms were used: the first uses a vector of real-valued parameters and the second uses a tree-structured generative representation for constructing the antenna. The highest-performance antennas from both algorithms were fabricated and tested and both outperformed a hand-designed antenna produced by the antenna contractor for the mission. Subsequent changes to the spacecraft orbit resulted in a change in requirements for the spacecraft antenna. By adjusting our fitness function we were able to rapidly evolve a new set of antennas for this mission in less than a month. One of these new antenna designs was built, tested, and approved for deployment on the three ST5 spacecraft, which were successfully launched into space on March 22, 2006. This evolved antenna design is the first computer-evolved antenna to be deployed for any application and is the first computer-evolved hardware in space.