Uncertainty modelling in reliable preliminary space mission design

In the early phase of the design of a space mission, it is generally desirable to investigate as many feasible alternative solutions as possible. At this particular stage, an insufficient consideration for uncertainty would lead to a wrong decision on the feasibility of the mission. Traditionally a system margin approach is used in order to take into account the inherent uncertainties within the subsystem budgets. The reliability of the mission is then independently computed in parallel. An iteration process between the solution design and the reliability assessment should finally converge to an acceptable solution. By combining modern statistical methods to model uncertainties and global search techniques for multidisciplinary design, the present work proposes a way to introduce uncertainties in the mission design problem formulation. By minimising the effect of these uncertainties on both constraints and objective functions, while optimising the mission goals, the aim is to increase the reliability of the produced results.