Without consensus, there are 400 in-orbit collision alerts from a single entity that space operators cannot question.

Current local coordination efforts can't translate globally, the decentralized way built on global incentives is the way.

Space DAO.

Problem in Space Traffic Management

Today, there are about 400 collision alerts in Earth orbits updated daily. Current space traffic management methods are centralized and reliant on a single source for collision predictions, raising concerns about technical biases, transparency issues, information manipulation and efficiency (see tables comparison of two different sources over seven observations). These predictions are extremely complex.

Today, uncontrolled reentry crashes happen in deserts and oceans (2 tons every week, up to 5 tons every two weeks). In the next 6 years, 1 out of 3 uncontrolled space object reentry has very high probability to crash on a city. There is an obvious lack of global governance in space traffic management and in the whole new space economy.

The increasing population of space objects significantly augments the risk of collisions as well as secondary collisions. Far, as little as a decade, from a Kessler Syndrome (with hypothesis of 150000 active objects in orbit, this is a chain reaction of collisions potentially totally disabling usage of certain orbits), the current lack of neutral and decentralized coordination is even more catastrophic with consequences in terms of geopolitical tensions and radical decision in rights to space access.

Today, there are more than 56 000 objects including debris of more than 10cm and active satellites in orbit. They all navigate at an average speed of 7km/s (yes 7000 meters per seconds, a two hour walk in one second), this means a 70g apricots in space has as much energy as a heavy truck driving full speed in a city. Anything in orbit is classically unstoppable.

Solution

A more than 91 Billion euros downstream space European market depends on global (= the world) safe space operations. Exploration and utilization of Earth orbit and beyond need incentivized coordination to build consensus in most critical decision making processes as well as to serve as regulatory medium for matters such as space traffic management, satellite-based emergency mapping for on ground disaster response management and in space resource management to grow our orbit coherently between business and science.

Space DAO, a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO), presents a global incentivized collaboration and coordination network. As a transparent and decentralized platform, the DAO supports applications (DApps) that can aggregate data from multiple sources and employ a consensus mechanism to validate and approve collision predictions, and other key information used in high stake decisions (such as disaster response, stakeholders ratings, etc.). It provides a more robust and reliable system for preventing unnecessary or, worse, disastrous decisions.

Through decentralization, the DAO incentivized the confrontation of different sources of information fostering trustless exchange between participants in order to enhance the accuracy of predictions, and reduce the reliance on any single entity. Operators maneuver their spacecraft based on this consensus allowing them to prevent unnecessary moves and high risks of secondary conjunctions. Regulators, auditors, insurers or space lawyers can over-watch and understand orbital situation globally in order to create relevant rules and additional incentives that matters.

Being a DAO, all stakeholders can actively participate in decision-making processes, ensuring that their collective expertise is considered. Ultimately, the DAO can contribute to a safer, more efficient, and equitable future for space exploration and utilization.

Current Progress

• European Space Agency Tech Innovation project for the concept design of blockchain based on-chain consensus mechanisms in collaboration with University of Strathclyde, Parametry.ai and Vision Space Technologies. Now keyed as "Space DAO".
• Creative Destruction Lab graduation for Parametry.ai: validating Space DAO as a massive impact project and evaluating all project risks and possibilities.
• Space professional community creation with involvement including, space lawyers, space operators and space situational awareness providers and enthusiasts.
• Our involvement in Web3 communities and resources to support the DeSpace QF crowd funding initiative to support all projects for a more decentralized space.
• First consensus contract for single scalar based consensus in solidity that we connected to external Web2 APIs thanks to the API223 tool we are building - another interesting by product for Web3 python developers.

Future work

• Nurture recent incubation in the European Space Agency business incubator.
• Build the full stack of smart contracts for space traffic management
• Write our full paper for our accepted abstract at the 10th Annual Space Traffic Management conference (Austin, TX, USA)
• Test decentralized work (such as DeWork) to decentralized the maintenance of the contracts.
• Being more present on social networks, especially decentralized one (e.g. Mastodon)
• Set up a neutral entity, foundation or NGO to sustain Space DAO activities.

Abstractedly speaking, Space DAO ensures its decentralized applications build valid consensus on key predictive information used in high-stake decisions:

• Space Traffic Management (today issue - discussed here)
• Disaster Response (future issue - already part of the initial work on Space DAO)
• Any other future business application relying on predictive information that you would submit.

Why web3 crowd funding

We want create full project independence. For now we are running on the funds of a small startup which risk being associated as the main and only maintainer of the smart contracts. While it is a model that is well in use, we would like to avoid it and propose instead of network of decentralized contributors rewarded thanks to your donations and then network activities when sustainable.

Key Information

• Official project website: https://spacedao.ai

• Official open discussion channel: https://app.element.io/#/room/#space-dao-community:matrix.org

• Mastodon: https://mastodon.world/@spacedao_ai

• Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/SpaceDAO_ai/

Why the ".AI"?

Key information exchange is often generated by AI algorithms. Space DAO can be seen as a high level AI output verification network by confrontation. Hence it builds consensus across AI predictors or generators like a ML ensemble method would do across weak learners.

Space DAO uses EVM-compatible machine learning techniques to build consensus and updated information sources trustworthiness.

We use, produce and support the creation of open source assets

The goal is that SpaceDAO can be continued generation after generation without requiring specific central authority agreement.

This means that using only twitter or github is not viable for us.

We use Gitlab as git/CI/CD platform as anyone has freedom to roll out their own gitlab instance (Gitlab is open source) even if a centralized authority/company decides to discontinue the convenient online service.

Also we are present on Mastodon and Matrix network as they are decentralized communication platforms. There is no ghosting or central censorship, and the network cannot be put down by merely central decisions.

Looking forward for your support.

(written in November 2023)