Navigation, Guidance, Control and Dynamics Commons^™

Integrated Collision Avoidance System Sensor Evaluation Final Design Project, Alex F. Graebe, Bridgette S. Kimball, Drew T. Lavoise

Mechanical Engineering

Following the development of Aircraft Collision Avoidance Technology (ACAT) by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), a need arose to transition the life-saving technology to aid the general aviation community. Considering the realistic cost of implementation, it was decided that the technology should be adapted to function on any smartphone, using that device as an end-to-end solution to sense, process, and alert the pilot to imminent threats. In September of 2012, the SAS (Sense and Survive) Senior Project Team at California Polytechnic University (Cal Poly), San Luis Obispo was assigned the task of using smartphone technology to accurately sense …

Low-Cost Imu Implementation Via Sensor Fusion Algorithms In The Arduino Environment, Brandon Mccarron

Aerospace Engineering

A multi-phase experiment was conducted at Cal Poly in San Luis Obispo, CA, to design a low-cost inertial measurement unit composed of a 3-axis accelerometer and 3-axis gyroscope. Utilizing the growing microprocessor software environment, a 3-axis accelerometer and 3-axis gyroscope simulated 6 degrees of freedom orientation sensing through sensor fusion. By analyzing a simple complimentary filter and a more complex Kalman filter, the outputs of each sensor were combined and took advantage of the benefits of both sensors to improved results. Gyroscopic drift was removed in the pitch and roll axes using the Kalman filter for both static and dynamic …

Uav Formation Flight Utilizing A Low Cost, Open Source Configuration, Christian W. Lopez

Master's Theses

The control of multiple unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in a swarm or cooperative team scenario has been a topic of great interest for well over a decade, growing steadily with the advancements in UAV technologies. In the academic community, a majority of the studies conducted rely on simulation to test developed control strategies, with only a few institutions known to have nurtured the infrastructure required to propel multiple UAV control studies beyond simulation and into experimental testing. With the Cal Poly UAV FLOC Project, such an infrastructure was created, paving the way for future experimentation with multiple UAV control systems. …

Feasibility Of Microsatellite Active Debris Removal Systems, Karsten J. James

Master's Theses

Space debris has become an increasingly hazardous obstacle to continued spaceflight operations. In an effort to mitigate this problem an investigation of the feasibility of a microsatellite active debris removal system was conducted. Through proposing a novel concept of operation, utilizing a grapple-and-tug system architecture, and by analyzing each resultant mission phase in the frame of a representative example, it was found that microsatellite scale systems are capable of fulfilling the active debris removal mission. Analysis of rendezvous, docking, control and deorbit mission requirements determined that the design of a grapple-and-tug system will be driven by sizing of the propellant …

Nasa Magnetospheric Multiscale Mission Tablesat 1c, Joshua Chabot, Joseph Kelley, Michael Johnson

Honors Theses and Capstones

The NASA Magnetospheric MultiScale (MMS) mission (to be launched in 2014) consists of four spin-stabilized spacecraft flying in precise formation. The MMS spacecraft, which have wire booms up to 60 m long, are analyzed using the UNH MMS TableSat IC, a limited 3-DOF rotation (full spin, limited nutation) table top prototype of the MMS spacecraft. A PID controller is implemented on TableSat IC to observe the effects of spin rate and nutation control on the experimental satellite bus and scaled booms. Nutation and spin are implemented independently and the behavior of the test bed with and without SDP booms is …

Error Characterization Of Vision-Aided Navigation Systems, Daniel A . Marietta

Theses and Dissertations

The goal of this work is to characterize the errors committed by an Image Aided Navigation (IAN) algorithm that has been developed for use as a navigation tool in GPS denied areas. The filter under study was developed by the Air Force Institute of Technology's Advanced Navigation Technology center, and has been the focus of numerous research efforts. Unfortunately, these studies have all been based on single runs or simulations, and such results may not be indicative of the true filter performance. This problem extends to IAN publications in general; no analysis of IAN based upon a sizable real world …

Inertial Navigation System Aiding Using Vision, James O. Quarmyne

Theses and Dissertations

The aiding of an INS using measurements over time of the line of sight of ground features as they come into view of an onboard camera is investigated. The objective is to quantify the reduction in the navigation states' errors by using bearings-only measurements over time of terrain features in the aircraft's field of view. INS aiding is achieved through the use of a Kalman Filter. The design of the Kalman Filter is presented and it is shown that during a long range, wings level cruising flight at constant velocity and altitude, a 90% reduction in the aided INS-calculated navigation …

Real-Time Heading Estimation Using Perspective Features, James W. Dean

Theses and Dissertations

There are a large number of commercially available quad-rotor helicopters available from various manufacturers. All of these systems rely on a low cost MEMS based inertial measurement system for stabilization and navigation. These low cost inertial systems are all subject to rapid error growth in their attitude and position estimates unless bounded by external measurements. This thesis created real-time algorithm to integrate measurements from visual cues with measurements from onboard sensors to estimate the attitude position and velocity of a quad-rotor helicopter in a local navigation frame, a system model for the ARDrone, and a feed-back controller for the vehicle's …

High Frequency Magnetic Field Direction Finding Using Mgl-S8a B-Dot Sensors, Michael D. Archer

Theses and Dissertations

Aircraft based direction finding (DF) in the high frequency (HF) band is difficult due to the aircraft's size with respect to wavelength and limited azimuthal resolution. A B-dot sensor is useful for detection of the time varying magnetic field and offers improved integration into an aircraft. What the B-dot sensor gains in integration it gives up in sensitivity because it is designed for frequencies above 5 GHz. Design of an airborne HFDF array using Bdot sensors is based in maximizing the physical extent of the array and eliminating multiple main beams. The goals of this research are to complete a …

Information Encoding On A Pseudo Random Noise Radar Waveform, Joshua A . Hardin

Theses and Dissertations

Navigation requires knowledge of current location and a planned destination. This is true with manned vehicles and unmanned vehicles. There are many ways to acquire the current location, including global positioning system (GPS), triangulation, radar, and dead reckoning. Today GPS is the most reliable and accurate navigation technique when there is a clear, unobstructed view of the satellite constellation. Various sensors can be used to perform indoor navigation; however, when the vehicle is autonomous the sensors need to provide the exact location to the system. This research determined if using a template replay strategy has the same RNR performance as …

Adaptations And Analysis Of The Afit Noise Radar Network For Indoor Navigation, Russell D. Wilson Iv

Theses and Dissertations

After several years of development, the AFIT Noise Radar Network (NoNET) has proven to be an extremely versatile system for many standard radar functions. This pallet of capabilities includes through the wall target tracking capabilities due to its wide bandwidth and UHF operations. Utilizing White Gaussian Noise as its waveform, the NoNET can operate at much lower power levels than other comparable systems while remaining extremely covert. In an effort to explore new applications, the question arose could the NoNET provide a viable option for navigation capability in GPS denied and indoor environments? This research aims to provide proof of …

Implementing A Matlab Based Attitude Determination Algorithm In C Within The Polysat Software Architecture, Dominic Bertolino

Computer Engineering

This project focuses on one component within a complete attitude determination and control system (ADCS) for a small satellite. The component consists of porting the algorithm that determines the current attitude of the satellite developed by AERO students / team members. The original algorithm has been developed in MATLAB code. The actual algorithm will be simulated and tested in MATLAB by the AEROs. The porting consisted of integrating the pieces into the custom PolySat software environment in C. Testing was done to verify the ported component corresponded to the original MATLAB component as well as verify its runtime on the …

A Gravity Gradient, Momentum-Biased Attitude Control System For A Cubesat, Ryan J. Sellers

Master's Theses

ExoCube is the latest National Science Foundation (NSF) funded space weather CubeSat and is a collaboration between PolySat, Scientific Solutions Inc. (SSI), the University of Wisconsin, NASA Goddard and SRI International. The 3U will carry a mass spectrometer sensor suite, EXOS, in to low earth orbit (LEO) to measure neutral and ionized particles in the exosphere and thermosphere. Measurements of neutral and ion particles are directly impacted by the angle at which they enter EXOS and which leads to pointing requirements. A combination of a gravity gradient system with a momentum bias wheel is proposed to meet pointing requirements while …

Robust Parafoil Terminal Guidance Using Massively Parallel Processing, Jonathan Rogers, Nathan Slegers

Faculty Publications - Biomedical, Mechanical, and Civil Engineering

Terminal guidance of autonomous parafoils is a difficult problem in which wind uncertainty and system underactuation are major challenges. Existing strategies almost exclusively use impact error as the criterion for optimality. Practical airdrop systems, however, must also include other criteria that maybe even more important than impact error for some missions, such as ground speed at impact or constraints imposed by drop zones with restrictions on flight patterns. Furthermore, existing guidance schemes determine terminal trajectories using deterministic wind information and may result in a solution that works in ideal wind but may be sensitive to variations. The work described here …

Indeterminate Masses, Elements And Models In Information Fusion, Florentin Smarandache

Branch Mathematics and Statistics Faculty and Staff Publications

In this paper at the beginning, we make a short history of the logics, from the classical Boolean logic to the most general logic of today neutrosophic logic. We define the general logic space and give the definition of the neutrosophic logic. Then we introduce the indeterminate models in information fusion, which are due either to the existence of some indeterminate elements in the fusion space or to some indeterminate masses.

The best approach for dealing with such models is the neutrosophic logic, which is part of neutrosophy. Neutrosophic logic is connected with neutrosophic set and neutrosophic probability and statistics.

Unmanned Autonomous Object Retrieval: Old Dominion University 2013 International Aerial Robotics Competition Entry, Johnathan Bailey, Austin Boyd, Chung-Hao Chen, Stephen Dailey, Lisa Henderson, Jeremy Stuart, Christina Williams

Electrical & Computer Engineering Faculty Publications

This paper describes the design implementation of a Quadrotor Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) with the capability of exploring indoor locations without the assistance of external aids. For relative position, the use of a laser range sensor, an optical flow sensor, and sonar sensor combined allows for the vehicle to generate mapping information. With relative position in mind, the vehicle uses vision algorithms to recognize immediate obstacles, sign, and entry ways to allow for quick movement responses and object recognition. A proportional-integral-differentiator controller allows for flight stability and mitigation in the tight confines of the indoor spaces. A mapping algorithm allows …

An Attitude Determination System With Mems Gyroscope Drift Compensation For Small Satellites, Maxwell Bezold

Theses and Dissertations--Electrical and Computer Engineering

This thesis presents the design of an attitude determination system for small satellites that automatically corrects for attitude drift. Existing attitude determination systems suffer from attitude drift due to the integration of noisy rate gyro sensors used to measure the change in attitude. This attitude drift leads to a gradual loss in attitude knowledge, as error between the estimated attitude and the actual attitude increases.

In this thesis a Kalman filter is used to complete sensor fusion which combines sensor observations with a projected attitude based on the dynamics of the satellite. The system proposed in this thesis also utilizes …

Visual Attitude Propagation For Small Satellites, Samir Ahmed Rawashdeh

Theses and Dissertations--Electrical and Computer Engineering

As electronics become smaller and more capable, it has become possible to conduct meaningful and sophisticated satellite missions in a small form factor. However, the capability of small satellites and the range of possible applications are limited by the capabilities of several technologies, including attitude determination and control systems. This dissertation evaluates the use of image-based visual attitude propagation as a compliment or alternative to other attitude determination technologies that are suitable for miniature satellites. The concept lies in using miniature cameras to track image features across frames and extracting the underlying rotation.

The problem of visual attitude propagation as …

Dynamics And Control Of Higher-Order Nonholonomic Systems, Jaime Rubio HerváS

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

A theoretical framework is established for the control of higher-order nonholonomic systems, defined as systems that satisfy higher-order nonintegrable constraints. A model for such systems is developed in terms of differential-algebraic equations defined on a higher-order tangent bundle. A number of control-theoretic properties such as nonintegrability, controllability, and stabilizability are presented. Higher-order nonholonomic systems are shown to be strongly accessible and, under certain conditions, small time locally controllable at any equilibrium. There are important examples of higher-order nonholonomic systems that are asymptotically stabilizable via smooth feedback, including space vehicles with multiple slosh modes and Prismatic-Prismatic-Revolute (PPR) robots moving open liquid …

Radar Based Navigation In Unknown Terrain, Kyle J. Kauffman

Theses and Dissertations

There is a great need to develop non-GPS based methods for positioning and navigation in situations where GPS is not available. This research focuses on the development of an Ultra-Wideband Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexed (UWB-OFDM) radar as a navigation sensor in GPS-denied environments. A side-looking vehicle-fixed UWB-OFDM radar is mounted to a ground or aerial vehicle continuously collecting data. A set of signal processing algorithms and methods are developed which use the raw radar data to aide in calculating the vehicle position and velocity via a simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) approach. The radar processing algorithms detect strong, persistent, and …