Mars Code
Mars Code | USENIX
Authors: Gerard Holzmann, JPL Laboratory for Reliable SoftwareAbstract: On August 5 at 10:18 p.m. PDT, a large rover named Curiosity made a soft landing on the surface of Mars. Given the one-way light-time to Mars, the controllers on Earth learned about the successful touchdown 14 minutes later, at 10:32 p.m. PDT. As can be expected, all functions on the rover, and on the spacecraft that brought it to Mars, are controlled by software. In this talk we review the process that was followed to secure the reliability of this code.Gerard Holzmann is a senior research scientist and a fellow at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the lab responsible for the design of the Mars Science Laboratory Mission to Mars and its Curiosity Rover. He is best known for designing the Logic Model Checker Spin, a broadly used tool for the logic verification of multi-threaded software systems. Holzmann is a fellow of the ACM and a member of the National Academy of Engineering.Open Access MediaUSENIX is committed to Open Access to the research presented at our events. Papers and proceedings are freely available to everyone once the event begins. Any video, audio, and/or slides that are posted after the event are also free and open to everyone. Support USENIX and our commitment to Open Access.



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