A switch-mode information fusion filter based on ISRUKF for autonomous navigation of spacecraft

Aiming at the problem of loss of accuracy using extended Kalman filter (EKF) in case of orbit maneuver, this paper proposes a novel information fusion filtering algorithm-iterated square root unscented Kalman filter (ISRUKF), and then designs a switch-mode information fusion filter based on ISRUKF and extended Kalman filter (EKF). This method combines navigation sensors' geocentric vector and geocentric distance with starlight angular distance, which efficiently improves the reliability of autonomous navigation. On this basis, the method deduced measurement function of information fusion. With a semi-physical simulation to verify the proposed method, the simulation results for stably running and orbital maneuvering spacecraft show that the switch-mode information fusion filter can reduce the complexity of the algorithm and ensure the accuracy of the estimation. Thus, the proposed switch-mode filter is very suitable for spacecraft autonomous navigation system and other strong nonlinear state estimation fields. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.