A survey of control strategies for spacecraft attitude and orientation

摘要

This paper presents a survey of different control methods deployed for spacecraft attitude control with a focus on strengths, weaknesses and opportunities for improvement. Common methods discussed include Sliding Mode Control (SMC), Unscented Kalman Filter (UKF) and Adaptive Control. Common challenges are the disturbances and uncertainties in space and produced by the spacecraft. This overview is used as a foundation for proposing useful research directions for developing improved control methods for the spacecraft attitude and orientation, with core requirements being low cost, robustness, precision, high efficiency and low computational load. The paper also summarises key actuation types used for satellite orientation, magnetics actuator and reaction wheels actuator, as the control strategy deployed, robustness and performance have strong links to the actuation.