Understand the operating environment
Survey orbital regimes, debris sources, mitigation approaches, space missions, and existing systems to establish the system context.
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FEATURED RESEARCH · SYSTEMS ENGINEERING · 2025
Architect the system.
Coordinate the mission.
A Systems Engineering Approach for Mitigating Space Debris in Earth's Orbital Regimes
01 / RESEARCH ABSTRACT
A growing orbital risk.
A systems-level response.
Space debris is not an isolated equipment problem. Collisions, anti-satellite testing, and growing satellite constellations create risks that cross mission, organizational, and national boundaries. Independently operated space systems can affect one another even when they have no common management authority.
This research developed a proposed Space Debris Management System (SDMS): a directed, collaborative systems-of-systems architecture intended to organize existing capabilities around orbital awareness, collision-risk response, and stakeholder coordination. The thesis used literature-based domain analysis, stakeholder identification, requirements engineering, architecture evaluation, and model-based systems engineering to describe the proposed system and its interfaces.
2025Systems engineering thesis
5Requirements levels traced
SoSCollaborative architecture
MBSESysML-based models and views
02 / SYSTEMS ENGINEERING METHOD
From stakeholder needs.
To architecture decisions.
The research follows a recognizable systems engineering workflow. It begins with the operational problem, develops stakeholder needs and requirements, and translates those needs into architecture descriptions that can be refined in subsequent engineering phases.
Identify competing needs
Analyze organizations, operators, and affected systems; identify needs and operational objectives for a collaborative response.
Build traceable specifications
Develop and organize stakeholder, functional, operational, system, and performance requirements, with traceability between levels.
Model interfaces and behaviors
Describe system context, collaborating entities, interactions, signals, use cases, and the proposed system-of-systems organization.
03 / PROPOSED SYSTEM ARCHITECTURE
Independent systems.
Coordinated outcomes.
The SDMS is conceived as an organizing and collaborating system operating within a directed system-of-systems environment. Rather than replacing every existing capability, the proposal focuses on the relationships, interfaces, and coordination needed across constituent systems.
CONTEXTOrbital environmentDebris hazards and existing capabilities
→NEEDSStakeholdersOperational objectives and concerns
→ENGINEERINGRequirements & modelsTraceability, context, and use cases
→PROPOSALSDMS architectureDirected collaboration across systems
SYSML / MAGICGRID
Model-based architecture
Developed MagicGrid problem-domain views for stakeholder needs, system context, and use cases. SysML elements described collaborating systems, interactions, and interface signals.
UAF / SoSE
Enterprise and SoS perspectives
Analyzed independent operation and management of constituent systems, selected a directed collaborative approach, and began mapping architecture descriptions into UAF views for further development.
04 / REQUIREMENTS ENGINEERING
Trace the need.
Define the system.
The thesis documented five requirements levels and their relationships. This is a concrete engineering deliverable: a structured path from stakeholder concerns toward functional, operational, implementation, and measurable performance expectations.
01Stakeholder needsHR — explicit needs
02Functional requirementsFR — required functions
03Operational requirementsOR — operational behavior
04System requirementsSR — system-level implementation
05Performance requirementsPR — measurable criteria
The requirements were documented and traced using a document-intensive engineering approach. Their continued refinement and integration into the MBSE model were identified as future work.
05 / TRADE STUDIES & ENGINEERING JUDGMENT
Evaluate the options.
Defend the selection.
Framework selection was treated as an engineering decision rather than a software preference. The thesis compared architecture frameworks and MBSE methodologies using qualitative and quantitative evaluation criteria.
MagicGrid was selected as a practical foundation for developing the SDMS model. Its SysML-based view specifications supported the problem-domain architecture and provided a path toward a broader Unified Architecture Framework (UAF) architectural description. The work also established a modeling direction using Magic Systems of Systems Architect.
Comparative analysis
Evaluated framework alternatives using defined criteria and scoring, then connected the selected approach to the proposed architecture.
Modeling-stack selection
Compared MBSE methods and justified a SysML, MagicGrid, and UAF approach for future architecture development.
06 / OPERATIONAL USE CASES
Architecture tied
to operational behavior.
The model includes use cases that make the architecture concrete, connecting system roles and interfaces to operational needs.
Debris forecast and simulation
Describe interactions supporting debris forecasting and simulation as inputs to orbital-risk awareness.
Stakeholder collaboration
Model the coordination needed among independently managed space-domain participants.
Collision-evasion maneuver
Represent the system interactions associated with executing a collision-avoidance response.
Conceptual and architectural
These are modeled operational use cases. The thesis does not claim a deployed autonomous collision-avoidance service.
07 / RESEARCH CONTRIBUTION
An architecture proposal.
A foundation for implementation.
The research produced a structured SDMS concept supported by stakeholder analysis, requirements and traceability tables, systems-of-systems classification, architecture descriptions, SysML-based views, use cases, and comparative framework evaluations.
The thesis deliberately establishes a foundation for further work. Future engineering includes expanding lower-level capabilities, refining the requirements, extending MagicGrid beyond its initial black-box problem-domain views, and developing a more complete UAF architectural description.
Source: Manuel Soto, The Application of Systems Engineering Methods for Mitigating Space Debris Concerns in Earth's Orbital Regimes, M.S. thesis, Department of Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering, The University of Texas at El Paso, May 2025. The title page and approval page use slightly different title wording. This page uses the title-page wording in its hero and the thesis-body wording here. The full PDF and thesis figures are not redistributed in this package.
08 / ENGINEERING CAPABILITIES DEMONSTRATED
Research you can review.
Engineering you can apply.
The artifacts demonstrate practical systems engineering activities: defining a system of interest, analyzing stakeholders, decomposing and tracing requirements, selecting architecture methods, developing system context and use cases, and communicating decisions through models.
These methods are transferable to aerospace, defense, complex integration programs, and other environments where independently managed systems must work together. The research is an architecture study—not evidence of fielded SDMS operations.
09 / CONNECT
Discuss systems engineering.
Explore collaboration.
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