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Comparing Unstable Cislunar Orbits for Efficient Transfers to Deep-Space Targets

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posted on 2025-01-10, 14:11 authored by Jonathan Howard RichmondJonathan Howard Richmond

With increasing interest in cislunar operations and exploration of deep space destinations like Mars, a foundational understanding of cislunar dynamics and their potential for facilitating departure from the vicinity of Earth is essential. This investigation addresses this need by analyzing system departure characteristics from a variety of periodic orbit families with unstable members in the Earth-Moon Circular-Restricted 3-Body Problem (CR3BP).

Specifically, a cislunar-to-Mars transfer methodology is developed, leveraging multi-body dynamical systems theory, especially invariant manifolds of periodic orbits, to design lower energy deep space transfers in comparison to traditional methods. The proposed approach generates families of end-to-end transfers that vary in total maneuver delta-v cost and time-of flight, originating from different unstable cislunar orbits. The tradespaces of these transfer families are then analyzed and compared across various departure orbits to identify departure characteristics across orbit families and energy levels (Jacobi constants). The analysis reveals certain unstable Earth-Moon CR3BP orbit families with more favorable departure characteristics.

Additionally, this investigation compares the computed deep space transfer costs with those of traditional interplanetary transfers and others from existing literature. Although this transfer design strategy is specifically applied to Mars transfers in this investigation, the methodology is broadly applicable to other deep space destinations. Furthermore, the general findings on cislunar departure characteristics have implications for mission designs to destinations beyond the Earth-Moon region.

History

Degree Type

  • Master of Science

Department

  • Aeronautics and Astronautics

Campus location

  • West Lafayette

Advisor/Supervisor/Committee Chair

Kathleen C. Howell

Additional Committee Member 2

Carolin Frueh

Additional Committee Member 3

Kenshiro Oguri

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