4025 Formation flying technology : the way to advance to the frontier space mission Technology
Details
Formation Flying (FF) is a technology that several satellites fly keeping a specific relative position one another. The technology breaks through constraint of dimension of satellites, and enables various missions such as X-ray telescope, infrared interferometer, SAR interferometer, gravity wave detection etc. To realize the missions, high accurate formation flying technology such as navigation and control of relative position and velocity among related spacecraft is necessary. We will develop the FF technology based on ETS-VII which performed in-orbit demonstration of autonomous rendezvous docking (RVD) technology and during three RVD experiment flights flew keeping definite ranges time and again. In this paper we present the FF research and development plan in JAXA, including in-orbit demonstration plan.
