SpeedStar: A Plug and Play Stellar Gyroscope for Responsive Spacecraft

Tactical warfighters need access to responsive spacecraft that can be put into operational service within weeks of a commander’s request. New plug and play avionic architectures are being investigated to support this need but lower cost inertial measurement systems are required to make spacecraft affordable to the tactical users. StarVision Technologies has recently completed feasibility demonstrations of an innovative concept to significantly reduce cost and increase flexibility of tactical satellites. By estimating spacecraft angular rates and orientation directly from high speed stellar observations we replace separate attitude and rate sensing instruments with a single device. The SpeedStar innovations allow a star tracker instrument to operate at update rates greater than 100 Hz, providing a tactical spacecraft with inertial rates and attitude at low cost without sacrificing the accuracy of conventional star tracker/gyro systems. The successful results of the Phase I effort have raised the technology maturity level of this novel concept and created the knowledge that will allow product development and commercialization with the proposed Phase II project.