Fuzzy Inference System-Applied Spacecraft Control for Final Approach of Rendezvous Process

In-space servicing has become popular for extending the lifetime of aging satellites that may have faulty components or no fuel. For such missions, a servicing spacecraft, referred to as the ‘chaser,’ approaches a target spacecraft in need of servicing. This work proposes an intelligent spacecraft control strategy using a fuzzy inference system (FIS) for a safe final approach of the chaser toward the target. The proposed FIS models are trained by a genetic algorithm using representative initial conditions, without considering disturbances, with the objective of minimizing the chaser's energy consumption. To validate the performance and effectiveness of the proposed model, the trained FIS-based control strategy is applied to various testing scenarios that consider random initial relative positions of the chaser, even in the presence of external disturbances.