Early Navigation Results for
NASA's MESSENGER Mission to Mercury, AAA 05-176, Jan. 2005
(pdf, 977KB)
Abstract: MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging (MESSENGER) mission is being flown as the seventh mission in NASA's Discovery Program. The MESSENGER mission is led by the principal investigator, Sean C. Solomon, of the Carnegie Institution of Washington. The project is managed by and the spacecraft was built and is operated by The John Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory. Navigation for the spacecraft is provided by the Space Navigation and Flight Dynamics Practice of KinetX, Inc., a private corporation. Navigation for launch ....
The B612 Mission Design, AIAA 2004-1448, Feb. 2004 (pdf, 59KB)
Abstract: This paper describes a mission proposed by the B612 Foundation to demonstrate the feasibility of docking a spacecraft with a small asteroid and applying a controlled, steady thrust to it in order to measurably alter the asteroid's orbit and rotation pole by the year 2015. The target would be a rocky 200-meter asteroid with a mass of about 10 billion kilograms that does not pose any impact threat to the Earth. The technology goal of the mission is to demonstrate a measurable change in the orbital velocity....
Configurable Spacecraft Control Architectures for On-Orbit Servicing and Upgrading of Long
Life Orbital Platforms, 2004 IEEE Aerospace Conference Proceedings (pdf, 364KB)
Abstract: Large orbital platforms provide unique and essential space-based capabilities for science, intelligence, and defense missions potentially supporting very large aperture imagers, antenna farms, SARs, radiometers and other systems. In order to provide maximum return on the investment required, it is essential to have a significant autonomous on-orbit servicing, upgrade and repair capability such that the platform can operate successfully for decades and have new platforms added to it. The dependence on human upgrades on-orbit must diminish ...