An Autonomous Orbit Determination System for Earth Satellites

Abstract

A new system for autonomous satellite navigation is developed and investigated. Unlike many previous studies, however, this system is not limited to the determination of an Earth satellite's current position. By using a two- step technique combined with a general perturbations model, this method allows the air-drag effect on the orbit to be estimated and applied to a future position prediction. Simulations using existing hardware have demonstrated that the algorithm presented is capable of current position estimates of sub- kilometer accuracy. Prediction precisions rival those of ground-based facilities: 8-12 kilometers two weeks in the future for low-Earth orbit. Keywords: Autonomous navigation; Orbit determination; Orbit prediction; Estimation; Position Estimation; Theses.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Dec 01, 1989
Accession Number
ADA215671

Entities

People

  • Kerry D. Hicks

Organizations

  • Air Force Institute of Technology

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Autonomy
  • Materials and Manufacturing Processes
  • Sensors
  • Space
  • Weapons Technologies

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Accuracy
  • Air Force
  • Algorithms
  • Artificial Satellites
  • Autonomous Navigation
  • Autonomous Systems
  • Computational Science
  • Coordinate Systems
  • Earth Orbits
  • Geosynchronous Satellites
  • Ground Based
  • Kalman Filters
  • Low Earth Orbits
  • Navigation
  • Space Systems
  • Spacecraft
  • Spacecraft Orbits

Readers

  • Neural Network Machine Learning.
  • Space Exploration and Orbital Mechanics.

Technology Areas

  • Space
  • Space - Orbital Debris