Distributed Space Systems: Applications, Deployment and Control

A special issue of Aerospace (ISSN 2226-4310). This special issue belongs to the section "Astronautics & Space Science".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 November 2022) | Viewed by 20706

Special Issue Editor


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Guest Editor
Keldysh Institute of Applied Mathematics of Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russia
Interests: spaceflight dynamics; attitude motion; attitude determination; satellite formation flying control algorithms
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Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The increasing complexity of approaches and methods of solving fundamental and applied problems of space exploration often leads to the need to create distributed space systems. A number of satellites united in one system and flying at a relatively short distance from each other or at similar orbits are simultaneously working on solving a common problem. The growing popularity of small satellites allows launching a large number of satellites. Due to constraints in mass, cost, and volume of the small satellites, however, translational and attitude motion control has become a scientific and engineering challenge. A wide variety of non-traditional and advanced classical control systems and approaches have been developed to solve particular problems for formation flying or constellations, though a thorough study of their application is required.

This Special Issue invites submissions that develop new formations flying or constellation control algorithms and investigate performance analytically, numerically or using laboratory testing. The topics include but are not limited to:

  • Small satellite formation flying dynamics;
  • Constellation deployment strategies;
  • Low-thrust propulsion application for distributed space systems;
  • Electromagnetic formation flying control;
  • Differential drag control application;
  • Satellite swarm control algorithms;
  • Active space debris removal by small satellites;
  • Relative navigation in formation flying;
  • AI and swarm intelligence control applications;
  • Ground testing of formation flying control algorithms;
  • Distributed space systems mission design.

Dr. Danil Ivanov
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

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Keywords

  • small satellite formation flying
  • constellation deployment
  • attitude dynamics
  • control algorithms
  • electromagnetic interaction
  • differential drag control
  • motion simulation
  • ground testing
  • mission design

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Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

21 pages, 4963 KiB  
Article
Application and Performance Evaluation of Resource Pool Architecture in Satellite Edge Computing
by Junxiang Qin, Xiye Guo, Xiaotian Ma, Xuan Li and Jun Yang
Aerospace 2022, 9(8), 451; https://doi.org/10.3390/aerospace9080451 - 17 Aug 2022
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 2169
Abstract
Satellites will play a vital role in the future of the global Internet of Things (IoT); however, the resource shortage is the biggest limiting factor in the regional task of massiveequipment in the IoT for satellite service. Compared with the traditional isolated mode [...] Read more.
Satellites will play a vital role in the future of the global Internet of Things (IoT); however, the resource shortage is the biggest limiting factor in the regional task of massiveequipment in the IoT for satellite service. Compared with the traditional isolated mode of satellite resources, the current research aims to realize resource sharing through satellite cooperation in satellite edge computing, to solve the problems of limited resources and low service quality of a single satellite. We propose a satellite resource pool architecture-oriented regional task in satellite edge computing. Different from fixed servers in ground systems, the satellite orbital motion brings challenges to the construction of the satellite resource pool. After the capacity planning of the satellite resource pool for regional tasks is given, an algorithm based on search matching is proposed to solve the dynamic satellite selection problem. A ground semi-physical simulation system is built to perform experiments and evaluate the performance of three modes of satellite resource sharing: isolated mode, cooperative mode, and pooled mode. The results show that the pooled mode, compared with the isolated mode, improves the task success rate by 19.52%, and at the same time increases network resources and energy consumption in the same scenario. Compared with the cooperation mode, the performance of task success rate and resource utilization rate is close to that of the pooled mode, but it has more advantages in response time and load balancing of satellite resources. This shows that in the IoT, the resource pool is of great benefit as it improves the task response time and improves the load balance of satellite resources without degrading the performance, which makes sense in task-demanding scenarios. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Distributed Space Systems: Applications, Deployment and Control)
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27 pages, 5481 KiB  
Article
Satellite Formation Flying for Space Advertising: From Technically Feasible to Economically Viable
by Shamil Biktimirov, Gleb Belyj and Dmitry Pritykin
Aerospace 2022, 9(8), 419; https://doi.org/10.3390/aerospace9080419 - 1 Aug 2022
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 16843
Abstract
The paper presents a feasibility study of satellite formation-flying missions for space advertising. To estimate a space advertising mission viability, the global population coverage model is designed and the demonstration schedule with a focus on larger cities is optimized for the formation of [...] Read more.
The paper presents a feasibility study of satellite formation-flying missions for space advertising. To estimate a space advertising mission viability, the global population coverage model is designed and the demonstration schedule with a focus on larger cities is optimized for the formation of small satellites deployed in repeat ground track Sun-synchronous orbits. Monetization of an image demonstration over a city depends on the city population, outdoor advertising cost, and parameters limiting the number of potential advertising observations. Formation lifetime expressed in terms of fuel consumption for image reconfigurations and maintenance is one of the key factors and is analyzed via numerical simulation of satellite formation-flying dynamics and control. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Distributed Space Systems: Applications, Deployment and Control)
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