Publications related to Guidance, Navigation and Control for Autonomous Cooperative Docking of CubeSats

Design for demise applied to spacecraft structural panels and experiments for ClearSpace One platform

With growing awareness of the vulnerability of the near-Earth space region and the anticipated surge in satellite objects, efforts are underway to assess and implement various mitigation strategies. These aim to minimize the impact of space activities and ...

EPFL2024

Microstrip patch antennas with broad beamwidth

Ismael Vico Triviño

Microstrip antennas offer a broad set of advantages such as low profile, light weight, easy fabrication and low cost. As these are desirable or even critical for a broad range of applications, there has been a large interest for these antennas in the anten ...

EPFL2023

Biomechanics at the workplace under hypogravity conditions

Tatiana Maillard

The main goal of my research is to establish guidelines for workplace design based on human biomechanics: specifically sitting workplaces and handling areas in 1/6G-1/3G (Moon, Mars) conditions. Such a workplace could be used in long-term space missions in ...

EPFL2022

Design of an intake and a thruster for an atmosphere-breathing electric propulsion system

Thomas Binderup Jensen, Francesco Romano

Challenging space missions include those at very low altitudes, where the atmosphere is the source of aerodynamic drag on the spacecraft, that finally defines the mission's lifetime, unless a way to compensate for it is provided. This environment is named ...

2022

Uncooperative Rendezvous in Space: Design of an Electronic Architecture for High Performance Avionic with Multi Sensor Input and Intensive Data Rate

Michaël Yannick Juillard

Active Debris Removal missions consist of sending a satellite in space and removing one or more debris from their current orbit. A key challenge is to obtain information about the uncooperative target. By gathering the velocity, position, and rotation of t ...

EPFL2022

Intensifying space activity calls for increased scrutiny of risks

Romain Buchs

As the pace of space activities accelerates and societies become more reliant on space-based systems, the associated risks deserve more attention. Satellites form a critical infrastructure on which military, civil and commercial entities rely. The services ...

EPFL International Risk Governance Center2021

Antennas for CubeSat Communication

Miroslav Veljovic

CubeSats are a type of small satellites (< 500 kg) that weigh several kilograms and consist of multiple Units (U) measuring 100 × 100 × 113.5 mm3. CubeSats emerged as a low-cost alternative to conventional large satellites, and have since demonstrated capa ...

EPFL2020

X-ray pulsar-based GNC system for formation flying in high Earth orbits

Camille Sébastien Pirat, Volker Gass

In this paper, comprehensive pulsar-based Guidance, Navigation and Control (GNC) system is designed and applied to satellites formation flying. The complete autonomy of the X-ray pulsar navigation technology provides both absolute and relative positioning ...

PERGAMON-ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD2020

Sun-synchronous repeat ground tracks and other useful orbits for future space missions

Sun Hee Kim, Luzius Gregor Kronig

The development of oceanography and meteorology has greatly benefited from satellite-based data of Earth's atmosphere and ocean. Traditional Earth observation missions have utilised Sun-synchronous orbits with repeat ground tracks due to their advantages i ...

2020

Guidance, Navigation and Control for Autonomous Rendezvous and Docking of Nano-Satellites

Camille Sébastien Pirat

Is it possible to dock CubeSats in Low Earth Orbit? Challenges are associated with the level of miniaturisation: the docking accuracy is driven by the docking mechanism dimensions. The achievable docking performance with the Guidance, Navigation and Contro ...

EPFL2018

Periodic cellular aluminum structures for space applications : from casting to additive manufacturing

Florian Thibaut Gallien

Mass is one of the crucial parameters for hardware that has to be placed in Earth orbit. Due to its harsh environment, a material with highest specific properties is desired to achieve space missions. The rise and development of new technologies, such as a ...

EPFL2018

Vision Based Navigation for Autonomous Cooperative Docking of CubeSats

Camille Sébastien Pirat, Volker Gass

A realistic rendezvous and docking navigation solution applicable to CubeSats is investigated. The scalability analysis of the ESA Autonomous Transfer Vehicle Guidance, Navigation & Control (GNC) performances and the Russian docking system, shows that the ...

2018

Wideband Cavity-Backed CubeSat Antenna in S band

Anja Skrivervik, Miroslav Veljovic

The Telemetry, Tracking and Command (TT&C) antennas are a crucial component of small satellites, as their in-orbit attitude is not always well-defined. The TT&C antenna design for a CubeSat is an even more challenging task, considering the volume restricti ...

The European Association on Antennas and Propagation (EurAAP)2018

High accuracy GNSS based navigation in GEO

Pierre-André Farine, Cyril Botteron, Vincenzo Capuano, Endrit Shehaj, Paul David Blunt

Although significant improvements in efficiency and performance of communication satellites have been achieved in the past decades, it is expected that the demand for new platforms in Geostationary Orbit (GEO) and for the On-Orbit Servicing (OOS) on the ex ...

Elsevier2017

An adaptive GNSS-based reduced dynamic approach for real time autonomous navigation from the Earth to the Moon

Pierre-André Farine, Cyril Botteron, Vincenzo Capuano, Endrit Shehaj, Paul David Blunt

In this research study we describe our last effort in further improving the achievable Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) based navigation performance in an Earth-Moon Transfer Orbit (MTO). The GNSS-based orbital filter we implemented previously wit ...

2017

GNSS/INS/Star Tracker Integration for Real-Time On-Board Autonomous Orbit and Attitude Determination in LEO, MEO, GEO and Beyond

Pierre-André Farine, Cyril Botteron, Vincenzo Capuano, Endrit Shehaj, Paul David Blunt

In our previous studies, we demonstrated that Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) signals can be processed, not only in Low Earth Orbit (LEO), but also in higher earth orbits, up to the Moon. In order to maximize the GNSSbased navigation performance, ...

2017

GPS Based Navigation Performance Analysis within and beyond the Space Service Volume for Different Transmitters’ Antenna Patterns

Pierre-André Farine, Cyril Botteron, Vincenzo Capuano, Endrit Shehaj, Paul David Blunt

In recent years, global navigation satellite system (GNSS)-based navigation in high earth orbits (HEOs) has become a field of research interest since it can increase the spacecraft’s autonomy, thereby reducing the operating costs. However, the GNSS availab ...

2017

Availability and ranging error analysis for a GPS L1/L5 receiver navigating to the Moon

Pierre-André Farine, Cyril Botteron, Ban Wang, Vincenzo Capuano, Endrit Shehaj, Paul David Blunt

Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) based navigation is already adopted in Low Earth Orbit (LEO), where the presence of strong GNSS signals and the good relative geometry between the receiver and the transmitters enable precise orbit determination. H ...

Ieee2017

Standalone GPS L1 C/A Receiver for Lunar Missions

Pierre-André Farine, Cyril Botteron, Jérôme Leclère, Vincenzo Capuano, Jia Tian, Yanguang Wang, Paul David Blunt

Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSSs) were originally introduced to provide positioning and timing services for terrestrial Earth users. However, space users increasingly rely on GNSS for spacecraft navigation and other science applications at severa ...

Mdpi Ag2016

GNSS-Based Navigation for Lunar Missions

Vincenzo Capuano

Numerous applications, not only Earth-based, but also space-based, have strengthened the interest of the international scientific community in using Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSSs) as navigation systems for space missions that require good accu ...

EPFL2016