Multiple spacecraft formation reconfiguration using solar radiation pressure

In this paper the use of solar radiation pressure for spacecraft formation reconfiguration at the L2 Sun-Earth/Moon collinear libration point is presented. The system consisting of a leader and three follower spacecraft is considered. The leader spacecraft is assumed to be in a fixed halo trajectory and the follower spacecraft position relative to the leader satellite is controlled using two angles and area; these are varied based on a variable structure model reference adaptive control technique to achieve the desired formation reconfiguration. This approach ensures that all follower spacecraft complete the required maneuver in the same time. An intertially fixed circular trajectory, which is suitable for interferometer missions, is used in this paper. The stability of the proposed controller is established using Lyapunov theory. The performance of the proposed controller is tested through numerical simulation of the governing nonlinear equations of motion and is applied for formation initialization, resizing, retargeting, and rotation. The numerical results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed control technique for spacecraft formation reconfiguration using solar radiation pressure at the L2 libration point. Furthermore, control inputs on the order of 15 degrees and 2 m2 for area change are sufficient to execute the maneuvers.