Smartphone didactic platform for satellite attitude determination demonstration and development

Abstract

Satellite technology has a major role for society development. It offers new methods allowing monitoring, telemetry and control… This domain requires research, practices and knowledge improvement for space access. However, the lack of necessary tools leads to misunderstand the satellite technology. Therefore, this paper presents a prototype demonstration around a smart phone based on Android platform for satellite attitude determination mission. It aims to give a practical experience in satellite mission understanding. This project provides a complete demonstration, in addition of the software development, the development of accuracy-improvement methods and loading software in hardware. In order to accomplish the goal of attitude determination, a GPS receiver and several sensors were used which are integrated into the smart phone. The GPS receiver was used for determining the position and the sensors to know the state of the environment. An algorithm based on quaternion with Kalman filter was proposed in order to improve the accuracy of orientation detection. Simulations were performed in random orientation and movement in order to demonstrate the performance of the method used. This system therefore results a good accuracy during the experience.