Target search methods for space situational awareness

Patel, Mihir Jagdishbhai

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https://hdl.handle.net/2142/101218 Copy

Description

Title

Target search methods for space situational awareness

Author(s)

Patel, Mihir Jagdishbhai

Issue Date

2018-04-25

Director of Research (if dissertation) or Advisor (if thesis)

Ho, Koki

Department of Study

Aerospace Engineering

Discipline

Aerospace Engineering

Degree Granting Institution

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Degree Name

M.S.

Degree Level

Thesis

Keyword(s)

• Space situational awareness
• tracking
• target search

Abstract

This work studies methods to detect target in an orbit around the Earth using a space based sensor. Searching for a target among a large set of candidate orbits is a difficult and time consuming problem. Considering orbital dynamics, sensor uncertainties and the initial size of candidate location distribution, it is desirable to develop efficient search techniques. In this work, information-theoretic methods for searching a target in a large probability distribution using a space based sensor is considered. One intuitive approach is to steer the sensor towards regions of high probability density. Alternatively, information-theoretic methods steer the sensor based on metrics of the information gain in the posterior probability distribution. Through simulation, it is shown that information-theoretic search methods produce greater knowledge about probability distribution of the target's orbit. We also present methods to lower the computing expense imposed on the computer on-board a space based sensor. The issue is addressed using data clustering technique called K-means clustering. It is shown that errors resulting from searching the target after clustering is much lower compared to errors resulting from searching targets at the locations of higher probability.

Graduation Semester

2018-05

Type of Resource

text

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http://hdl.handle.net/2142/101218

Copyright and License Information

Copyright 2018 Mihir Patel

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