Mu-analysis Based Verification and Validation of Autonomous Satellite Rendezvous Systems

This paper presents a Verification and Validation (VV) framework that integrates Linear Fractional Transformation (LFT) and mu-analysis with simulation based VV. This innovative VV framework is developed for the terminal phase of Mars Sample Return autonomous orbital rendezvous around Mars. The concept consists in steering a global nonlinear time simulations environment in function of linear robustness analysis in order to establish the global system properties more efficiently than with a traditional Monte-Carlo simulations-based framework. This paper presents the technique with a proof of concept that compares the traditional approach with this new VV framework. The analysis of the results highlights the efficiency of the technique.