Multiple-spacecraft reconfiguration through collision avoidance, bouncing, and stalemate

We consider constrained multiple-spacecraft reconfigurations outside a gravity well in deep space. As opposed to the single-spacecraft scenario, such reconfigurations involve collision avoidance constraints that can be embedded in a nonconvex, state-constrained optimal control problem. Due to the difficulties in solving this general class of optimal control problems, we adopt a heuristically motivated approach to multiple-spacecraft reconfigurations. Then, we proceed to prove the convergence properties of the proposed approach for reconfigurations involving an arbitrary number of spacecraft.