Spacecraft Guidance Sensing at Relativistic Velocities
In this chapter a solution to the problem of planning an interstellar voyage at relativistic velocities by automatic control was proposed. To this aim, position and velocity of a relativistic interstellar spacecraft can be found by means of automatic measurements onboard of the aberrated angular dis...
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| Autor principal: | |
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| Formato: | Capítulo de libro |
| Lenguaje: | inglés |
| Publicado: |
IntechOpen
2020
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| Materias: | |
| Acceso en línea: | https://www.intechopen.com/chapters/68103 |
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| Sumario: | In this chapter a solution to the problem of planning an interstellar voyage at relativistic velocities by automatic control was proposed. To this aim, position and velocity of a relativistic interstellar spacecraft can be found by means of automatic measurements onboard of the aberrated angular distances between three quasars, at least. Indeed, this set can represent a reliable inertial reference frame due to the circumstance that quasars can be considered fixed in the space due to their large distances from Earth. To this aim, the so-called apical latitude and longitude of some quasars can be obtained from their right ascension α and declination δ in astronomical catalogues, using some mathematical expressions to provide the aberrated coordinates of a relativistic spacecraft during an interstellar space mission. The algorithm used in this study showed that the accuracy of determining the aberrated apical coordinates of a spacecraft increases significantly using quasars with aberrated apical latitude values lower than 45° in the direction of motion, suggesting that one or more normal-sized telescopes aboard the spacecraft can use quasars within a cone with angular aperture of about 45°, providing aberrated apical latitudes of the spacecraft with errors ranging from 10−7 to 10−9. |
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| ISBN: | 978-1-78984-802-1 |
| DOI: | 10.5772/intechopen.87981 |