Science optimal spacecraft attitude maneuvering while accounting for failure mode

We present a framework to generate optimal sequence of actions for spacecraft missions. Our framework is based on an application of the theory of Markov decision processes and stochastic dynamic programming. While this framework is general, we present our approach in the context of a specific spacecraft mission, requiring spacecraft attitude control for pointing to collect science data from a number of celestial objects. Our generated sequences are optimal in a sense that the expected reward of science data collected in the presence of the possible failures is maximized.