Starlab: an Orbiting Space Technology Applications & Research Laboratory

Publisher Marketing: STARLAB is a 35-man orbiting Space Technology Applications and Research Laboratory preliminary design and a training exercise in the systems approach. The selected orbit is 308 n. mi. with a 69-degree inclination which enables coverage of 93 percent of the earth's surface. The onboard experiments utilize research and application laboratories with auxiliary supporting laboratories. A laser communication system with a 3000 megabits per second data rate, three synchronous communication satellites, and an earth-based administration function comprises the information management system. Emphasis is given to earth resources, chemistry, life/behavioral sciences, physics, materials and manufacturing, communication, navigation and traffic control, manned space flight engineering, and astronomy. Systems engineering, or the systems approach, is an accepted term to describe the multidisciplinary or interdisciplinary character of the "systematic design" of any large engineering system. It emphasizes and attempts to systematize, through the availability of modern techniques, the design of modern, complex, and multidisciplinary engineering systems. The term seems to have originated in the aerospace field where the complexity of modern aerospace systems demanded a systematically controlled approach to design to ensure that all factors of all subsystems, representing many disciplines, were carefully integrated into the final system. The importance of the multidisciplinary systems approach has been recognized by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration to the extent that NASA, in conjunction with the American Society for Engineering Education, conduct Systems Engineering Faculty Fellowship Programs as well as Research Faculty Fellowship Programs at NASA Centers with local universities during the summer of 1969. There were eight research-oriented programs and four Systems Engineering design programs. The purpose of the design programs is to develop a systems approach philosophy by group participation in a design training experience. The resulting design is of secondary importance to the training aspect of the program. It is hoped the faculty will use the experience to develop the systems approach in courses at their home institutions as well as use the experience to lead others in system solutions of complex multidisciplinary problems. This approach, though discussed considerably in the news media, has had little use exterior to the space program. The approach has application in solving engineering as well as socioeconomic problems.