Engineering topics

Paul Levinson Muth

Publications and source records attributed to Paul Levinson Muth.

3 records

NASA NTRS2025

Preliminary Node Separation Orbit Determination Analysis for the HelioSwarm Observatory

The HelioSwarm Observatory is a nine-spacecraft swarm design, consisting of one Hub and eight Node spacecraft co-orbiting the Earth in a ~13.7-day orbit. Each Node separates from the Hub during the Node Commissioning Phase, and the Nodes’ sole source of tracking is inter-satellite relative ranging with the Hub. This study characterizes how soon the relative ranging should occur post-separation to maintain a reasonable knowledge of the Nodes’ position relative to the hub and quantifies how often, and at what measurement cadence, relative ranging needs to occur during the early days of commissioning.

orbit determination↗

NASA NTRSDate not supplied

HelioSwarm: Relative Orbit Maintenance in Eccentric P/2 Lunar Resonant Orbit

Science missions employing multi-point measurements require planned and repeatable swarm geometries. Cis-lunar orbits enable heliophysics studies of solar wind but introduce new challenges in relative motion control. For a multi-satellite swarm in lunar-resonant orbit, insertion and maintenance maneuvers address orbit eccentricity and evolution, as well as three-body gravitational perturbations. Local Velocity-Normal-Conormal coordinates prove to be an effective framework for relative motion design and control. Parametric studies investigate maneuver placement efficiency in controlling relative motion in cis-lunar orbit.

Relative Motion↗

NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Lunar Browser trajectory tool

The Lunar Browser is a tool developed at NASA Ames Research Center for building, processing, and analyzing a database of lunar transfer trajectory solutions. Examples of intended uses include design trades for lunar missions and preliminary assessments of key parameters such as launch opportunities, delta-v and propulsion budgets, communication windows, eclipse durations, and lunar landing windows. The Lunar Browser tool is in the development phase and it is already producing results in its current form to address various NASA program requirements, proposals, and mission trajectories. The tool has also been used for research analysis in trajectory design, including a first publication regarding its application to the CLPS and Artemis programs. In particular, the results included transfers to lunar frozen orbits. Future work include the generation of more trajectories to expand the existing database and the optimization of the results.

Lunar Browser trajectory tool↗