RFID in Space: Exploring the Feasibility and Performance of Gen 2 Tags as a Means of Tracking Products

Abstract

The emergence of location based systems such as GPS and RFID has received attention in the academic community due to their significant impact on business activities as well as personal life (Lin et al., 2010; Ma et al., 2010; Velandia et al., 2016). RFID technologies have been widely used by leading organizations for activities such as security and assess control, ticketing, and positioning (Ni et al., 2004; Gnoni et al., 2009) as well as supply chain systems (Fan et al., 2015; Shin and Eksioglu, 2015). Companies such as Wal-Mart have been using RFID technologies as an effective tool to improve their inventory management systems (Roberti, 2005). While the effect of RFID and its positive effect on business activities have received much attention in recent years, the research community has not paid enough attention to RFID research.

We aim to fill the gap in RFID research by investigating how RFID technologies can be effectively used in the aviation industry. The NASA Constellation Program has identified the need for an improved mechanism to track consumables and other critical hardware and supplies without impacting crew time. The current NASA Inventory Management System (IMS) tracks loose and stowed hardware via a barcode system, but only tracks items such as crew clothing, office supplies, and hygienic supplies at the bag level. Periodic, manually intensive crew audits must be conducted to identify the current state of the inventory. The NASA Constellation Program elected to evaluate RFID technologies for a new inventory management system. RFID technologies were selected in an effort to create the most effective and user- friendly IMS.