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Full-Text Articles in Astrodynamics

Orbital Debris Analysis And Orbital Decay Analysis Of Arksat-2, Will Stuff May 2022

Orbital Debris Analysis And Orbital Decay Analysis Of Arksat-2, Will Stuff

Mechanical Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

ARKSAT-2 is a cube satellite developed by the University of Arkansas for its second CubeSat mission. There are two objectives of the ARKSAT-2 mission. The first objective of this mission is to test a novel cold gas thruster propulsion system using water-propylene propellant. This propulsion system will be used for attitude control of the satellite. The second objective for the ARKSAT-2 mission is to test a Solid-State Inflation Balloon (SSIB) that has been designed and developed for this mission. The SSIB is designed to be a simple and cost-effective method for deorbiting the vehicle. In cube satellites, a software known …


Underactuated Attitude Control Of A Cubesat Using Cold Gas Thrusters And Nonlinear Control Methods, Adam S. Cottrell Mar 2022

Underactuated Attitude Control Of A Cubesat Using Cold Gas Thrusters And Nonlinear Control Methods, Adam S. Cottrell

Theses and Dissertations

Impulsive thrusters on small satellites, such as CubeSats, are typically used for attitude control. However, to become more agile, small CubeSats must also look to propulsion systems utilizing impulsive thrusters, such as cold-gas, for translational maneuvers. The combined thrust vector is often misaligned with the system's center of mass resulting in a disturbance torque. This must be counteracted by either an attitude determination and control system (ADCS), additional thrusters, or a control method to keep the satellite's attitude at or near equilibrium. Nonlinearities generated by the impulsive maneuvers are overcome via control techniques explored in this research to include on-off …


Exploring The Concept Of A Deep Space Solar-Powered Small Spacecraft, Kian Guillaume Crowley Jun 2018

Exploring The Concept Of A Deep Space Solar-Powered Small Spacecraft, Kian Guillaume Crowley

Master's Theses

New Horizons, Voyager 1 & 2, and Pioneer 10 & 11 are the only spacecraft to ever venture past Pluto and provide information about space at those large distances. These spacecraft were very expensive and primarily designed to study planets during gravitational assist maneuvers. They were not designed to explore space past Pluto and their study of this environment is at best a secondary mission. These spacecraft rely on radioisotope thermoelectric generators (RTGs) to provide power, an expensive yet necessary approach to generating sufficient power. With Cubesats graduating to interplanetary capabilities, such as the Mars-bound MarCO spacecraft, matching the modest …


Analysis Of An Inflatable Gossamer Device To Efficiently De-Orbit Cubesats, Robert A. Hawkins Jr. Dec 2013

Analysis Of An Inflatable Gossamer Device To Efficiently De-Orbit Cubesats, Robert A. Hawkins Jr.

Master's Theses

There is an increased need for spacecraft to quickly and efficiently de-orbit themselves as the amount of debris in orbit around Earth grows. Defunct spacecraft pose a significant threat to the LEO environment due to their risk of fragmentation. If these spacecraft are de-orbited at the end of their useful life their risk to future spacecraft is greatly lessened. A proposed method of efficiently de-orbiting spacecraft is to use an inflatable thin-film envelope to increase the body's area to mass ratio and thusly shortening its orbital lifetime. The system and analysis presented in this project is sized for use on …


Open Space Box Model: Service Oriented Architecture Framework For Small Spacecraft Collaboration And Control, Atif F. Mohammad, Jeremy Straub Feb 2013

Open Space Box Model: Service Oriented Architecture Framework For Small Spacecraft Collaboration And Control, Atif F. Mohammad, Jeremy Straub

Jeremy Straub

A Cubesat is a small satellite with very less competence to compute, it requires software engineering techniques, which can enhance the computational power for this small box. A model-driven approach of software engineering, which is called OSBM or Open Space Box Modeling technique, is an excellent solution to this re-source maximization challenge. OSBM facilitates apparition of the key solution pro-cesses computation and satellite related data elements using Service Oriented Ar-chitecture 3.0 (SOA 3.0) as base to work on to design services. The key challenges that can be handled by utilizing OSBM include concurrent operation and tasking of few as five …


An Analysis Of Stabilizing 3u Cubesats Using Gravity Gradient Techniques And A Low Power Reaction Wheel, Erich Bender Jun 2011

An Analysis Of Stabilizing 3u Cubesats Using Gravity Gradient Techniques And A Low Power Reaction Wheel, Erich Bender

Aerospace Engineering

The purpose of this paper is to determine the feasibility of gravity gradient stabilizing a 3U CubeSat and then using a miniature reaction wheel to further increase stability characteristics. This paper also serves as a guide to understanding and utilizing quaternions in attitude control analysis. The analytical results show that using 33 centimeter booms and 400 gram tip masses, a 3U CubeSat will experience a maximum of 6 degrees of angular displacement in yaw and pitch, and less than .5 degrees of angular displacement in the nadir axis. A .120 kilogram miniature reaction wheel developed by Sinclair Interplanetary was introduced …