Related papers: Nonlinear Model Predictive Detumbling of Small Sat…
Solar sails offer a promising solution for fuel free propulsion, enabling novel mission profiles and deeper space exploration. While reaction wheels are standard for spacecraft attitude control, the large moment of inertia of solar sails…
This paper addresses the trajectory tracking control problem for underactuated VTOL UAVs. According to the different actuation mechanisms, the most common UAV platforms can achieve only a partial decoupling of attitude and position tasks.…
In this paper, a robust control solution for a satellite equipped with a robotic manipulator is presented. First, the dynamic model of the system is derived based on quaternions to describe the evolution of the attitude of the base…
We study the optimal control of an arbitrarily large constellation of small satellites operating in low Earth orbit. Simulating the lack of on-board propulsion, we limit our actuation to the use of differential drag maneuvers to make…
This paper introduces a novel control strategy for agile spacecraft attitude control, addressing reaction wheel-related input and state constraints. An optimal-decay control Lyapunov function quadratic program stabilizes the system and…
This paper presents a method to control a manipulator system grasping a rigid-body payload so that the motion of the combined system in consequence of externally applied forces to be the same as another free-floating rigid-body (with…
Detumbling refers to the act of dampening the angular velocity of the satellite. This operation is of paramount importance since it is virtually impossible to nominally perform any other operation without some degree of attitude control.…
On-orbit manual attitude control of manned spacecraft is accomplished using external visual references and some method of three axis attitude control. All past, present, and developmental spacecraft feature the capability to manually…
In this paper, a dynamic-programming approach to the coupled translational and rotational control of thruster-driven spacecraft is studied. To reduce the complexity of the problem, dynamic-programming-based optimal policies are calculated…
This paper considers the problem of achieving attitude consensus in spacecraft formations with bounded, time-varying communication delays between spacecraft connected as specified by a strongly connected topology. A state feedback con-…
The challenge of satellite stabilization, particularly those with uncertain flexible dynamics, has become a pressing concern in control and robotics. These uncertainties, especially the dynamics of a third-party client satellite,…
A method for asteroid deflection that makes use of a spacecraft moving back and forth on a segment of an appropriate Keplerian orbit about the asteroid is described and evaluated. It is shown that, on average, the spacecraft describing such…
We present a concept for a spacecraft that can controllably alter the trajectory of an Earth threatening asteroid using gravity as a towline. The spacecraft hovers near the asteroid with thrusters angled outward so the exhaust does not…
This paper discusses spacecraft control using variable-speed CMGs. A new operational concept for VSCMGs is proposed. This new concept makes it possible to approximate the complex nonlinear system by a linear time-varying system (LTV). As a…
Actuator self-heating limits the achievable force and can cause unwanted structural deformations. This is especially apparent in quasi-static actuation systems that require the actuator to maintain a stable position over an extended period.…
The use of control barrier functions under uncertain pose information of multiple small servicing agents is analyzed for a satellite servicing application. The application consists of modular servicing agents deployed towards a tumbling…
This paper addresses the design and application controller for a small-size unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV). In this work, the main objective is to study the modeling and attitude controller design for a small size helicopter. Based on a…
Over the several decades, the space debris at LEO has grown rapidly which had caused a serious threat to the operating satellite in an orbit. To avoid the risk of collision and protect the LEO environment, the space robotics ADR concept has…
This paper addresses the distributed attitude synchronization problem of multiple spacecraft with unknown inertia matrices. Two distributed adaptive controllers are proposed for the cases with and without a virtual leader to which a…
A chaser satellite equipped with robotic arms can capture space debris and manipulate it for use in more advanced missions such as refueling and deorbiting. To facilitate capturing, a caging-based strategy has been proposed to simplify the…