Space mission design and operations

EE-585

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Course summary

Space Mission Design & Operations

Dr Thibault Kuntzer



The objective of this course is to present and consolidate the concepts of design and execution of space missions beyond the Earth's atmosphere. Numerous examples will be presented and the concepts will be reinforced by exercice sessions.




Friday 13

Why space?, near-Earth environment
• Course admin
• Why do we go to space?
• Review of laws of mechanics and notions of energy
• Earth’s atmosphere and magnetic field
• The radiation environment
Lecture 08.15-10.00  ELA1


Friday 20

  

Introduction to orbital mechanics
• Gravitational well
• Escape velocity
• Reference frames and calendars
• The two body problem and Kepler’s laws
• Orbital motion
Lecture

08.15-10.00  ELA1

Friday 27

Orbital classes
• Space weather and the Sun activity cycle
• Orbital regimes
• Ground track
• Atmospheric drag and lifetime
• Non-keplerian effects and special orbits (incl Sun-Synchronous)

Lecture


08.15-10.00 ELA1


Friday 04
Spacecraft dynamics
• Orbital manoeuvres (Hohmann, small Δv in LEO, plane change)
• Complex manoeuvres & Lambert’s problem
• Orbit determination
• Launch and early orbit phase, positioning and station-keeping

Lecture

 
08.15-10.00  ELA1

Friday 11


Exercise session 1
Exercises 08.15-10.00  ELA1

Friday 18
Spacecraft interaction, object population in
Earth’s orbit

• Phasing
• Rendezvous, proximity operations and docking (RPOD) and relative motion
• Motivation for RPO(D)
• The resident space object population and the debris problem

Lecture 08.15-10.00  ELA1


Friday 25


No course - Week off                                         



 

 

Friday 01
Exercise session 2

Exercises
08.15-10.00  ELA1

Friday 08
Interplanetary trajectories
• The deep space environment
• Near Earth Objects
• Sphere of influence
• Interplanetary trajectories
• Aerobraking

Lecture

 
08.15-10.00  ELA1

Erratum: on slide 35, in the sentence, the text should have read The braking manoeuvre Δvp,insert is the difference between the velocity at perigee of the elliptic orbit vp,insert and the velocity at perigee of the hyperbolic orbit vp. The pdf has been updated.


Friday 15
Interplanetary trajectories, spacecraft propulsion
• Slingshots
• Lunar trajectories
• Propulsion systems
• Non-impulsive manoeuvres

Lecture

 
08.15-10.00  ELA1

Erratum: on slide 40, the equation of the propellant mass used as a function of the final mass should read mp = mf*[exp(Delta v / (Isp * g0)) - 1]. The pdf has been updated.


Friday 22
Exercise session 3

Exercises08.15-10.00  ELA1

Friday 29
Launch, critical subsystems
• Attitude control
• Power generation
• Ascent to orbit, re-entries

Lecture

 
08.15-10.00  ELA1

Friday 06
Constellations, Operations
• Elevators to space, tethered deployment
• Spacecraft constellations and mega-constellations
• Major governmental and commercial actors in space
• Old & new space
• Collision probability and avoidance manoeuvres
• Spacecraft concept of operations (mission planning, execution, personnel, infrastructures, products)

Lecture

 
08.15-10.00  ELA1

Friday 13
Human spaceflight
• Guest lecture by astronaut Claude Nicollier

Lecture

 
08.15-10.00  ELA1

Friday 20
Exercise session 4
Exercises 08.15-10.00  ELA1

20 January - 26 January