Decentralized Control of Satellites

Status: Completed project, September 2001 -- August 2002
Type: Guidance and Control Algorithms

The purpose of this task is to examine different control laws, particularly decentralized algorithms, for the guidance and control of formations of satellites.

Satellite formations are better suited to certain space applications than individual satellites.  There are a number of different approaches that can adopted for formation control.  One example is a centralized approach, where the entire formation is controlled from a single master satellite or ground station.  This method can be contrasted with a decentralized approach, with each satellite having the ability to determine its own actuation with a limited set of information from nearby satellites. 

This study examines the performance of these different systems and implements a decentralized control algorithm that could be fielded with GPS receivers.  It is shown that the algorithm can provide local optimality in the required control effort, but global optimality is not guaranteed.