Integrated attitude and shape control for OrigamiSats with variable surface reflectivity



Robb, Bonar, Russo, Aloisia, Soldini, Stefania ORCID: 0000-0003-3121-3845, Paoletti, Paolo ORCID: 0000-0001-6131-0377, Reveles, Juan, Bailet, Gilles and McInnes, Colin R
(2023) Integrated attitude and shape control for OrigamiSats with variable surface reflectivity. Acta Astronautica, 211. pp. 393-404.

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Abstract

OrigamiSats, a new concept in solar sailing, are origami spacecraft with reflective panels that, when flat, operate as a conventional solar sail. Shape reconfiguration, i.e. “folding” of the origami design, allows the OrigamiSat to change operational modes, performing different functions as per mission requirements. For example, a flat OrigamiSat could be reconfigured into the shape of a parabolic reflector, before returning to the flat configuration when required to operate again as a solar sail, providing propellant-free propulsion. The attitude dynamics and shape reconfiguration of OrigamiSats are known to be highly coupled, thus presenting a challenge from a control perspective. This paper investigates the problem of integrating attitude and shape control of a Miura-fold pattern OrigamiSat through the use of variable reflectivity, allowing differences in solar radiation pressure to be used to enact shape reconfiguration and attitude manoeuvres. A closed-loop feedback controller is presented which combines and balances the attitude and shape control requirements, and gain-scheduling is implemented to address some specific features of the system dynamics. Numerical simulations of the multibody dynamics of the system are used to test the proposed controller and simulations of some example manoeuvres are performed which demonstrate the system's performance.

Item Type: Article
Uncontrolled Keywords: Origami, Solar sailing, OrigamiSats, Dynamics, Control, Attitude control, Shape control, Reconfigurable spacecraft, Gain-scheduling, Numerical simulation, Raytracing
Divisions: Faculty of Science and Engineering > School of Engineering
Depositing User: Symplectic Admin
Date Deposited: 03 Jul 2023 10:47
Last Modified: 10 Aug 2023 07:02
DOI: 10.1016/j.actaastro.2023.06.025
Related URLs:
URI: https://livrepository.liverpool.ac.uk/id/eprint/3171407