Discrete time sliding mode control for satellite clusters at Lagrange points

This paper presents a discrete time sliding mode control system based upon a discrete reaching rate law and applied to an autonomous 6DoF satellite cluster located at the interior Sun-Earth Lagrange point. Centralized decision processes with distributed action are used to enable cluster dispersal from a central spacecraft and reconfiguration to optimally form an interferometer array dependant upon the number of cluster members, whilst considering collision avoidance.