Plume Avoidance Maneuver Planning Using Mixed Integer Linear Programming

Arthur Richards, Jonathan P. How, Tom Schouwenaars, and Eric Feron

Proceedings of the AIAA Guidance, Navigation, and Control Conference,
Montreal, August 2001.

This paper extends a recently-developed path planning method to account for {\em plume impingement}, which is a key concern for on-orbit rendezvous and formation flying spacecraft. The approach designs fuel-optimal trajectories for multiple vehicles using a combination of linear and integer programming. The vehicles are required to move from an initial dynamic state to a final state without colliding with each other or firing the thrusters in a way that would hit another vehicle. This problem is written as a linear program with mixed integer/linear constraints that prohibit collisions and plume impingements. A key benefit of this approach is that the problem can be readily solved using the AMPL language and CPLEX optimization software with a Matlab interface. Examples are given of this method applied to satellite cluster reconfiguration, ISS remote camera maneuvering and ground vehicle guidance.

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