Program Control of a Spacecraft With Electric Propulsion Engines in the Vicinity of an Asteroid

The article considers the control of the center of mass motion of a spacecraft with a low-thrust propulsion system in the vicinity of an irregularly shaped asteroid. Formation of the motion control program during mission planning is complicated by incomplete knowledge of the asteroid’s gravity. A superposition of N attractive points rotating with the asteroid’s own angular velocity at a constant distance can be used as a mathematical model of the asteroid’s gravitational potential. A preliminary study of the research object allows calculating the characteristics of such a model with two attractive centers. Software control in the vicinity of the asteroid for target maneuvers is formed on the basis of a combination of locally optimal control laws and the developed algorithm of relay switching between them with a dead zone. The developed algorithms and methods are illustrated by the results of modeling the spacecraft motion in the vicinity of the asteroid 433 Eros.