Stable attitude control for an underactuated flexible spacecraft equipped with a rotating panel

This study introduces an effective attitude-tracking method for flexible spacecraft equipped with rotating appendages, employing an Adaptive Super-Twisting Sliding Mode Control (ASTSMC) framework. To mitigate the difficulties and potential inaccuracies of conventional analytical modeling, a graphical modeling approach is utilized, providing a more intuitive and dependable simulation process. A Simulink-based spacecraft model is constructed, where the flexible appendages are modeled as plate-like structures. Reaction-wheel jitter is explicitly included to represent realistic disturbance sources. Additionally, an Extended State Observer (ESO) is incorporated to estimate and counteract jitter-related disturbances and unmodeled dynamics, ensuring resilient attitude-tracking performance in the presence of structural flexibility and reaction-wheel excitation.