Introduction of promoting Very Long Baseline Interferometry for deep space tracking in China

Very Long Baseline Interferometry (VLBI) has been developed in China near 30 years for astronomical studies. Since 2003, following the development of Chinese lunar and deep space exploration, the astronomical VLBI technique was adapted for tracking and orbiting the Chinese Chang'E 1 & 2 missions, and played important role on positioning the orbit injection and hard landing. Since 2007, the concepts of open loop Doppler, differential one way range (DOR) and different one way Doppler (DOD) have been accepted by Chinese VLBI system for Martian missions. It has been successfully tested when tracking the ESA MarsExpress Mission. In the near future, same beam VLBI technique will also be applied by this system for tracking dual Martian mission Phbos-Grunt and Yinghuo-1, as well as positioning the Chang'E-3/4 landers & rovers. Based on these engineering and technical developments, close collaboration with other VLBI systems and networks have been set[1–3].