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4 - Navigation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 October 2014

Pierre T. Kabamba
Affiliation:
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Anouck R. Girard
Affiliation:
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
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Summary

In this chapter, we present the theory that is used in the analysis and design of navigation systems for aerospace vehicles, with an emphasis on the fundamentals rather than on their hardware implementation. The purpose of navigation is twofold: to estimate the position and velocity of a vehicle based on the output of imperfect sensors and to assess the accuracy of these estimates. Mathematically, this corresponds to computing the first and second moments (expected value and covariance) of a particular random variable. Note that one should not neglect the importance of the accuracy assessment. Indeed, for a vehicle traveling in the vicinity of Earth, the question “Where is the vehicle?” can always be answered by “On the Sun, to within one light-hour.” (Recall that the Earth is 8 light-minutes away from the Sun.) Such an answer, although it is correct, is totally useless for guiding the vehicle in the vicinity of the Earth. It is therefore very important to quantify the navigation error.

We start, in Section 4.1, by considering the navigation problem under the most restrictive assumptions: perfect sensors, nonredundant measurements, static estimation, nonrecursive processing, and perfect clock. Then, in subsequent sections, we remove these assumptions sequentially to build up the theory. Specifically, Section 4.2 considers position fixing with imperfect, nonredundant measurements, and Section 4.3 treats the case of imperfect redundant measurements.

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Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2014

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  • Navigation
  • Pierre T. Kabamba, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Anouck R. Girard, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
  • Book: Fundamentals of Aerospace Navigation and Guidance
  • Online publication: 05 October 2014
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781107741751.005
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  • Navigation
  • Pierre T. Kabamba, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Anouck R. Girard, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
  • Book: Fundamentals of Aerospace Navigation and Guidance
  • Online publication: 05 October 2014
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781107741751.005
Available formats
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Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Navigation
  • Pierre T. Kabamba, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Anouck R. Girard, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
  • Book: Fundamentals of Aerospace Navigation and Guidance
  • Online publication: 05 October 2014
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781107741751.005
Available formats
×