Investigation of future geodesy mission concepts for their feasibility and requirements to the AOCS subsystem

Abstract

Missions like GRACE and GRACE-FO have successfully established a continuous time series of data for Earth gravity field estimation. The continuous observation of Earths gravitational field is essential for the understanding of Earths mass transportation and climate change. Since GRACE-FO is already in service and the demand of more accurate data series arises, new Mission concepts need to be investigated to guarantee the continuation of the data time series and to increase the accuracy of Earths gravity field estimation. The German Aerospace Center (DLR) Institute for Satellite Geodesy and Inertial Sensing, as well as ZARM University of Bremen, is developing a simulation environment called the Hybrid Simulation Platform for Space Systems (HPS) to examine future geodesy satellite mission concepts. The simulation platform is capable of modelling for the atmospheric, magnetic, radiative, and gravitational environment in orbit and their coupling into system and sensor-specific effects. This work focuses on next-generation gravimetry mission (NGGM) concepts with multiple satellites and different satellite constellation approaches, such as pendulum orbits, bender orbits and swarm constellations, being examined with the help of the HPS simulator. In addition, new quantum sensors are considered to measure Earths gravitational field which put increased requirements on the AOCS subsystem, especially when considering drag-free control concepts. Requirements for the AOCS subsystem will be derived to evaluate the feasibility of such mission concepts and sensors. In parallel, collaborations with experts in orbit propagation and quantum sensors are being established within the scope of the German Collaborative Research Center TerraQ focusing on the improvement of Gravity field determination both on ground and space level. This paper presents the current status of the research.