Spacecraft Attitude Control based on Iterative Sequential Action Control

This paper proposes a novel spacecraft attitude optimal control method based on Iterative Sequential Action Control (ISAC). First, unit quaternions are used to describe the attitude of spacecraft and the nonlinear attitude dynamics are presented. Then, the derivation and implementation steps of the proposed ISAC attitude control method are presented. This method is able to perform online and generate control laws that are suitable for spacecraft control mechanism. Simulation results show that the method has high control accuracy and speed of response with great engineering application potential. Finally, problems and directions of the future research are summarized.

I. Introduction

With the development of space technology and deepening of its application, space missions are becoming more complex, multi-constrained, autonomous and net-worked, which also poses more problems and challenges to the design of spacecraft control systems. As one of the most basic control units of spacecraft, attitude control system is the basic guarantee for spacecraft to carry out complex space tasks such as on-orbit servicing [1] and space observation [2]. The performance of attitude control system has a very important impact on the stability and reliability of spacecraft service process in space orbit.