Determination of the orientation of the artificial Earth satellite in the case of diffusive scattering of light by its surface

Abstract

The paper considers the basics of the developed method for determining the orientation of low-orbit and geosynchronous spacecraft based on the results of observations of diffuse light scattering by their surfaces. This scattering can be described by phase functions that depend on the shape of the scattering surface, its orientation relative to the directions to the radiation source, and the receiver. Determining the orientation of the irradiated object in the selected coordinate system is one of the cases of solving the inverse problem. The surfaces of the spacecraft are a superposition of several stereometric surfaces that simultaneously scatter light onto the observer, but are differently oriented towards him, which greatly complicates the solution. The application of the developed method was carried out using the data of colorimetric observations of the American meteorological artificial satellite "NOAA-18", which has a cylindrical shape with two flat solar panels.