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Formation Flying Guidance for Space Debris Observation, Manipulation and Capture

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Part of the book series: Astrophysics and Space Science Proceedings ((ASSSP,volume 44))

Abstract

This article provides a brief overview of the space debris population, debris attitude dynamics, technologies for debris removal, followed by a more in-depth discussion of robotic arm based capture of debris. Guidance aspects of active debris removal missions are discussed. Mission phases for active debris removal missions are rendezvous, inspection, attitude synchronization and capture and de-tumbling. The need for attitude synchronization is driven by recent observations of Envisat which exhibits a fairly high rotation rate.

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Correspondence to Thomas V. Peters .

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© 2016 Springer International Publishing Switzerland

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Peters, T.V. (2016). Formation Flying Guidance for Space Debris Observation, Manipulation and Capture. In: Gómez, G., Masdemont, J. (eds) Astrodynamics Network AstroNet-II. Astrophysics and Space Science Proceedings, vol 44. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-23986-6_16

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