Assembly and reconfiguration of space structure using heterogeneous satellite swarms

Abstract

A scheme for the on-orbit autonomous assembly and reconfiguration of the ultra-large space structure inspired by Vicsek fractal is developed in this paper. The grouped and staged strategy is applied to the structure consisting of 125 rigid modular satellites and two flexible modular ones. Each assembly action is divided into pre-assembly and docking steps, while the reconfiguration involves dispersal, unit reconfiguration and reassembly phases. The dynamics model of satellites is established based on the Clohessy-Wiltshire equations and rotation matrix. Relative position and attitude controllers are designed for the mission, where a collision avoidance controller is combined in the pre-assembly step particularly. The Lyapunov stability is analyzed and the proposed strategy is demonstrated by both numerical simulations and an experiment on air-bearing testbed.