AUTONOMOUS INTEGRATED GPS/INS NAVIGATION EXPERIMENT FOR OMV

THE FOCUS OF THE PROPOSED RESEARCH IS THE DEFINITION AND DEVELOPMENT OF AN AUTONOMOUS INTEGRATED GPS/INTERTIAL NAVIGATION SYSTEM THAT CAN BE READILY IMPLEMENTED IN REAL-TIME ON ONBOARD COMPUTERS TO IMPROVE THE TOTAL NAVIGATION PERFORMANCE OF ADVANCED SPACE TRANSPORTATION SYSTEMS (STS), SUCH AS OMV, AOTV, SPACE STATION AND SHUTTLE C. THE GPS/INERTIAL TRACKING CONCEPT FOR STSS PROPOSED HEREIS AN EXTENSION OF THE GPS TRACKING CONCEPT WHICH HAS BEEN STUDIED EXEXTENSIVELY. THE PROPOSED GPS/INERTIAL NAVIGATIONTECHNIQUE COMBINES THE GPS INTERFEROMETRIC CARRIER PHASE PROCESSING, ORIGINALLY DEVELOPED FOR SHORT BASELINE SURVEYING, WITH THE GPS/INERTIAL NAVIGATION FILTER PROCESSING, TO OBTAIN AN ACCURATE, CONTINUOUS POSITION, VELOCITY AND ATTITUDE DATA FOR SPACECRAFT APPLICATIONS. THECONTINUOUS GPS TRACKING OF ADVANCED STSS WILL MINIMIZE GROUND TRACKING REQUIREMENTS AND WILL PROVIDE FLEXIBILITY INMISSION PLANNING. WE PROPOSE TO TARGET THE GPS/INERTIAL NAVIGATION FILTER DEVELOPMENT FOR THE OMV. THE RATIONALES FOR SELECTING THE OMV AS THE DEMONSTRATION PLATFORM FOR THISEXPERIMENT ARE THAT THE OMV WILL HAVE ONBOARD GPS RECEIVERS,TWO GPS ANTENNAE, AND THE RECEIVER MEASUREMENTS WILL BE AVAILABLE AS ON OUTPUT FOR PROCESSING BY THE PROPOSED NAVIGATION FILTER ALGORITHMS.