Modified dynamic programming for asteroids belt exploration

Abstract

In the past, space trajectory optimisation was limited to the design of space transfers to single destinations. More recent mission concepts however present the challenge to target multiple destinations; be it for science, exploration or even exploitation. This paper focuses on space trajectories that aim to visit multiple main-belt asteroids with one single spacecraft. The trajectory design of these missions is complicated by the fact that the asteroid sequence is not known a priori, but it is the objective of the optimisation problem. Usually, these problems are tackled as global optimisation problems under the formulation of Mixed-Integer Non-Linear Programming, on which the design variables assume both continuous and discrete values. However, beyond the aim of finding the global optimum, mission designers are usually interested in providing a wide range of mission design options reflecting the multi-modality of the problem. The paper describes a multi-fidelity design pipeline that enables a consistent exploration of all feasible asteroid tours with a given set of mission boundary conditions (e.g., launch window, mission duration, Δv). The consistency of the exploration is ensured by a deterministic search scheme which retains the n-best paths at each stage of a dynamic programming process. Bellman's principle of optimality is made applicable by transcribing the search space into a series of discretized events defined by asteroid index and fly-by epoch, as well as ensuring optimal substructure property with the choice of transfer model and design variables. The method is deployed to explore asteroid tour opportunities visiting 10 or more main belt objects and mission boundary conditions compatible with medium or discovery class missions. 79 million such trajectories are found with launch date in 2037.