In the past years, the idea of taking advantage of sequences of ballistic gravity assists has been widely considered to optimize interplanetary transfers. In the framework of multi-body dynamics, successive encounters with a third body affect all the orbital elements, though the main effect, exploited to reduce the propellant requirements, is the variation in semi-major axis and inclination. A successful example is represented by the SMART-1 lunar mission, which used the perturbation of the Moon to raise the perigee of the orbit to get captured by it. Other mission concepts have been hypothesized on the same basis, such as tours of planetary moons about Jupiter and Saturn. With this work we extend the studies performed so far, mainly established on a planar approximation and numerical explorations, to the three dimensional case. The aim is to address the role of the angle of approach with the third body in the variation of the semi-major axis and the inclination of the orbit, analyzing the analytical estimation provided by three different point of views, namely the classical patched conic approach and the Lagrange planetary equations applied to the third body perturbation in two different ways. The Circular Restricted Three-Body Problem are instead considered for a numerical verification. As practical applications, we show how to dispose an Earth spacecraft in highly elliptical orbit at the end of life by increasing its perigee toward the Moon and how to move a libration point orbit Sun-Earth mission toward the outer Solar System and decrease its Minimum Orbit Intersection Distance.

Out-of-plane extension of resonant encounters for escape and capture

COLOMBO, CAMILLA;
2013-01-01

Abstract

In the past years, the idea of taking advantage of sequences of ballistic gravity assists has been widely considered to optimize interplanetary transfers. In the framework of multi-body dynamics, successive encounters with a third body affect all the orbital elements, though the main effect, exploited to reduce the propellant requirements, is the variation in semi-major axis and inclination. A successful example is represented by the SMART-1 lunar mission, which used the perturbation of the Moon to raise the perigee of the orbit to get captured by it. Other mission concepts have been hypothesized on the same basis, such as tours of planetary moons about Jupiter and Saturn. With this work we extend the studies performed so far, mainly established on a planar approximation and numerical explorations, to the three dimensional case. The aim is to address the role of the angle of approach with the third body in the variation of the semi-major axis and the inclination of the orbit, analyzing the analytical estimation provided by three different point of views, namely the classical patched conic approach and the Lagrange planetary equations applied to the third body perturbation in two different ways. The Circular Restricted Three-Body Problem are instead considered for a numerical verification. As practical applications, we show how to dispose an Earth spacecraft in highly elliptical orbit at the end of life by increasing its perigee toward the Moon and how to move a libration point orbit Sun-Earth mission toward the outer Solar System and decrease its Minimum Orbit Intersection Distance.
2013
64th International Astronautical Congress (IAC 2013)
9781629939094
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/11311/1008478
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