SpaceRipple: Lightweight Semantic Delivery for Mission-Oriented LEO Earth Observation Satellite Networks

Abstract: Earth observation satellite networks generate massive volumes of high-resolution imagery, whereas inter-satellite and downlink resources remain limited. In many time-sensitive missions, ground users require mission-relevant semantic information rather than a full raw-image downlink. This paper proposes SpaceRipple, a lightweight framework for mission-oriented semantic delivery and on-board processing in Earth observation satellite networks. A sensing satellite performs adaptive compression and metadata generation to reduce inter-satellite traffic, while an edge computing satellite restores the received representation and extracts task-relevant semantic information. Unlike fidelity-driven image transmission, SpaceRipple coordinates compression, forwarding, restoration, and semantic inference within a collaborative pipeline, enabling semantic-oriented delivery instead of pixel-level image delivery. A compression-aware MoE enhancement module is further introduced to improve robustness under degraded visual inputs. Experimental results show that SpaceRipple achieves favorable reconstruction quality, improved semantic detection performance, and substantial bandwidth savings, demonstrating its potential for efficient and reliable Earth observation under constrained satellite-network resources.