Interstellar Autonomous Navigation System Using X-Ray Pulsar and Stellar Angle Measurement

Abstract

In order to improve the performance of interstellar autonomous navigation system, an interstellar autonomous navigation system using X-ray pulsar and stellar angle measurement is proposed. In this system, an X-ray detector, which is fixed on a gimbaled axis, is adopted. The detector can point at the different X-ray pulsars that are visible. By augmenting the clock error and the clock drift error as a component of the spacecraft state, the proposed system can correct the clock error of the atomic clock onboard. Furthermore, the observability of the corresponding system is investigated, and the result shows that the system is completely observable at most of time. The proposed system can provide an improved performance than traditional version of celestial navigation system (CNS). Through consequentially measure the difference pulsars, the proposed system can have a satisfactory performance. The proposed navigation system provides a prospective way for the realization of the deep space autonomous navigation system.