Orbital Containment Control Algorithm and Complex Information Topology Design for Large-Scale Cluster of Spacecraft

Abstract

In order to investigate coordinated orbit control problem for large-scale cluster flight spacecraft, a distributed orbital containment control algorithm is proposed for spacecraft cluster flight system with multiple leaders. At first, a general distributed orbital containment control strategy for large-scale cluster spacecraft system is given, so that all followers are driven to the convex hull formed by leaders. Then the constraints of convergence and convergence rate of cluster spacecraft system on control gains and information topology are investigated. Specifically, the control gains which achieve maximal convergence rate are analyzed. Furthermore, two kinds of cell partitions from graph theory are employed to investigate the influence of information topology on steady states of followers, which provides theoretical basis for collision avoidance design. Finally, simulation results show that the designed information topology could meet the requirements of large-scale cluster system, and followers belonging to the same cell have the same steady states.

Keywords

• Large-scale cluster
• orbital control
• multiple leaders
• containment control
• graph theory
• topology design