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Formation Flying Design and Applications in Weak Stability Boundary RegionsWeak Stability regions serve as superior locations for interferometric scientific investigations. These regions are often selected to minimize environmental disturbances and maximize observing efficiency. Design of formations in these regions are becoming ever more challenging as more complex missions are envisioned. The development of algorithms to enable the capability for formation design must be further enabled to incorporate better understanding of WSB solution space. This development will improve the efficiency and expand the capabilities of current approaches. The Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) is currently supporting multiple formation missions in WSB regions. This end-to-end support consists of mission operations, trajectory design, and control. It also includes both algorithm and software development. The Constellation-X, Maxim, and Stellar Imager missions are examples of the use of improved numerical methods for attaining constrained formation geometries and controlling their dynamical evolution. This paper presents a survey of formation missions in the WSB regions and a brief description of the formation design using numerical and dynamical techniques.
Document ID
20030025665
Acquisition Source
Goddard Space Flight Center
Document Type
Preprint (Draft being sent to journal)
Authors
Folta, David
(NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Greenbelt, MD, United States)
Date Acquired
August 21, 2013
Publication Date
January 1, 2003
Subject Category
Spacecraft Design, Testing And Performance
Meeting Information
Meeting: New Trends in Astrodynamics and Applications
Location: College Park, MD
Country: United States
Start Date: January 20, 2003
End Date: January 23, 2003
Distribution Limits
Public
Copyright
Work of the US Gov. Public Use Permitted.

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