We want to explore small celestial bodies to gain information on the origins of the Solar System, the Earth, and life. Exploration of small bodies is, however, difficult and filled with uncertainties, making mission design very complicated. Utilising swarms mitigates a lot of the challenges, but needs a multi-disciplinary approach. More often than not, designs tend to be individually optimal, but they are not holistic – thus even though the singular components are well designed, the mission architecture as a whole might suffer.
The paper classifies swarms as formation flying (dynamics coupled to maintain formation) and constellation swarms (require no coordination between participants). Furthermore, swarms are classified from Class 0 (no coordination) to Class 4 (acts as a single entity).
It focuses on the IDEAS software (Integrated Design Engineering and Automation of Swarms), which provides an end-to-end framework for spacecraft swarm missions. The automated swarm designer module attempts to find swarm configurations for asteroid mapping operations and evaluate the sensitivity of the design.
The paper used a model use case of a mission to Deimos, with minimum Class 2 swarm with resonant co-orbits around Mars. The following solutions were provided for the swarm via the software, based on the mission parameters:
- Trajectory design
- Trajectory optimization
- Trajectory performance
- Swarm design
- Swarm optimization
- Mapping performance
- Spacecraft design
- Main aerobraking phase
- Sensitivity analysis
- Sensitivity to spacecraft outages
- Sensitivity to moon’s location
- Sensitivity to spacecraft encounter location
The paper concludes that a multi-disciplinary tool such as IDEAS is necessary, utilising algorithms for optimisation, as swarm mission design to small bodies might be unintuitive for humans.
Source:
teja Nallapu, R., & Thangavelautham, J. (2021). Design and sensitivity analysis of spacecraft swarms for planetary moon reconnaissance through co-orbits. Acta Astronautica, 178, 854–869. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.actaastro.2020.10.008