Restricted constellation design for regional navigation augmentation

Abstract

The ninth edition of the China Trajectory Optimization Competition (CTOC9) considered the problem of navigation augmentation over a set of Chinese cities, wherein the competitors were expected to design a suitable LEO constellation to obtain the required navigation performance with the aim of minimizing overall system cost. In addition, an economical deployment strategy was also considered. The synthesis methods used by the Xi'an Satellite Control Center (XSCC) are described, along with the promising solution found by the team. Firstly, two techniques, feasible region based reduction and coverage region based reduction, are applied in sequence to narrow the search space. Then, the optimal constellation configuration is obtained through an Differential Evolution Algorithm (DE). Finally, a series of maneuver strategies are searched to inject each navigation satellite from a given initial carrying orbit to its target location. The solution obtained during the competition ranked third, and the improved one, found after the deadline, got the outstanding prize.