Hamiltonian adaptive control of spacecraft

A new approach to the accurate attitude tracking control of rigid spacecraft handling large loads of unknown mass properties is proposed. The method, based on the construction of a physically motivated Lyapunov-like function, is inspired by the adaptive robot control algorithm of J.J.E. Slotine and W. Li (Int. J. Robot. Res., vol.6, no.3, 1987), and presents similar advantages over techniques based on inverse dynamics in terms of simplicity, easier approach to robustness issues, and adaptive capabilities. The approach is illustrated in simulations.>