Autonomous and Distributed Motion Planning for Satellite Swarm

We present a satellite path-planning technique able to make a set of identical spacecraft acquire a given configuration. The technique exploits a behavior-based approach to achieve an autonomous and distributed control over the relative geometry, making use of limited sensorial information. A desired velocity is defined for each satellite as a sum of different contributions coming from generic high-level behaviors. The behaviors are further defined by an inverse-dynamic calculation dubbed equilibrium shaping. We show that by considering only three different kinds of behavior it is possible to acquire a number of interesting formations, and we describe the theoretical framework needed to find the entire set. We find that by allowing a limited amount of communication the technique may be used also to form complex lattice structures. Several control feedbacks able to track the desired velocities are introduced and discussed. Our results suggest that sliding-mode control is particularly appropriate in connection with the developed technique.