Cybersecurity in Space Domain Awareness and Exploration
Projet Description
Space operations have long been led by governmental space agencies (e.g., NASA and international partners) and established space companies. Today, however, the entry of startup companies and newly spacefaring nations is rapidly increasing space traffic and adding new layers of complexity. This growth raises urgent challenges for secure information sharing, negotiation, and cooperation in space.
This project will advance the theory, methods, and algorithms for space cybersecurity, establishing a foundational framework for secure, collaborative space ecosystem across Earth orbits and cislunar space. This research will integrate cryptographic techniques (e.g., multi-party computation and homomorphic encryption) with information theory, control theory, and astrodynamics to create privacy-preserving decision-making frameworks for space domain awareness and exploration.
Recent studies (e.g., Ref. 1) have shown the feasibility of enabling satellites to collaboratively compute collision risks without disclosing sensitive orbital data. Building on this, the project will address challenges in secure collision avoidance maneuver planning in cislunar space, where the sensitive dynamics demand careful maneuver design under information-sharing constraints. The research will extend these methods to support autonomous, uncertainty-aware multi-spacecraft operations under cybersecurity constraints, which may leverage recent studies on spacecraft autonomy and tracking of uncooperative spacecraft trajectory (e.g., Ref. 4, 5).
Start Date
Spring/Summer/Fall 2026
Postdoc Qualifications
Successful candidates must hold a Ph.D. in Aerospace, Electrical, Mechanical Engineering, or in a related area by the date of the position start, with a strong interest in the security of cyber-physical systems for space applications.
Prior experience in one or more of the following areas is required: information theory, control theory, and astrodynamics.
Co-advisors
Kenshiro Oguri, koguri@purdue.edu, AAE, URL: https://engineering.purdue.edu/OguriGroup
Takashi Tanaka, tanaka16@purdue.edu, AAE and ECE, URL: https://networked-control-systems-lab.github.io/
Bibliography
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