• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.247-264
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• 2014

In this paper, a brief but essential development strategy for the lunar orbit determination system is discussed to prepare for the future Korea's lunar missions. Prior to the discussion of this preliminary development strategy, technical models of foreign agencies for the lunar orbit determination system, tracking networks to measure the orbit, and collaborative efforts to verify system performance are reviewed in detail with a short summary of their lunar mission history. Covered foreign agencies are European Space Agency, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, Indian Space Research Organization and China National Space Administration. Based on the lessons from their experiences, the preliminary development strategy for Korea's future lunar orbit determination system is discussed with regard to the core technical issues of dynamic modeling, numerical integration, measurement modeling, estimation method, measurement system as well as appropriate data formatting for the interoperability among foreign agencies. Although only the preliminary development strategy has been discussed through this work, the proposed strategy will aid the Korean astronautical society while on the development phase of the future Korea's own lunar orbit determination system. Also, it is expected that further detailed system requirements or technical development strategies could be designed or established based on the current discussions.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.29 no.3
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• pp.275-285
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• 2012

In this study, we present preliminary results of precise orbit determination (POD) using satellite laser ranging (SLR) observations for International Laser Ranging Service (ILRS) Associate Analysis Center (AAC). Using SLR normal point observations of LAGEOS-1, LAGEOS-2, ETALON-1, and ETALON-2, the NASA/GSFC GEODYN II software are utilized for POD. Weekly-based orbit determination strategy is applied to process SLR observations and the post-fit residuals check, and external orbit comparison are performed for orbit accuracy assessment. The root mean square (RMS) value of differences between observations and computations after final iteration of estimation process is used for post-fit residuals check. The result of ILRS consolidated prediction format (CPF) is used for external orbit comparison. Additionally, we performed the precision analysis of each ILRS station by post-fit residuals. The post-fit residuals results show that the precisions of the orbits of LAGEOS-1 and LAGEOS-2 are 0.9 and 1.3 cm, and those of ETALON-1 and ETALON-2 are 2.5 and 1.9 cm, respectively. The orbit assessment results by ILRS CPF show that the radial accuracies of LAGEOS-1 and LAGEOS-2 are 4.0 cm and 5.3 cm, and the radial accuracies of ETALON-1 and ETALON-2 are 30.7 cm and 7.2 cm. These results of station precision analysis confirm that the result of this study is reasonable to have implications as preliminary results for administrating ILRS AAC.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.33 no.1
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• pp.37-44
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• 2016

This paper presents an algorithm for Real-Time Orbit Determination (RTOD) of navigation satellites for the Korean Regional Navigation Satellite System (KRNSS), when the navigation satellites generate ephemeris by themselves in abnormal situations. The KRNSS is an independent Regional Navigation Satellite System (RNSS) that is currently within the basic/preliminary research phase, which is intended to provide a satellite navigation service for South Korea and neighboring countries. Its candidate constellation comprises three geostationary and four elliptical inclined geosynchronous orbit satellites. Relative distance ranging between the KRNSS satellites based on Inter-Satellite Ranging (ISR) is adopted as the observation model. The extended Kalman filter is used for real-time estimation, which includes fine-tuning the covariance, measurement noise, and process noise matrices. Simulation results show that ISR precision of 0.3-0.7 m, ranging capability of 65,000 km, and observation intervals of less than 20 min are required to accomplish RTOD accuracy to within 1 m. Furthermore, close correlation is confirmed between the dilution of precision and RTOD accuracy.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Surveying, Geodesy, Photogrammetry and Cartography
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• v.27 no.1
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• pp.693-700
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• 2009

For real-time precise GPS data processing such as a long baseline network RTK (Real-Time Kinematic) survey, PPP (Precise Point Positioning) and monitoring of ionospheric/tropospheric delays, it is necessary to guarantee accuracy comparable to IGS (International GNSS Service) precise orbit with no latency. As a preliminary study for determining near real-time satellite orbits, the general procedures of satellite orbit determination, especially the dynamic approach, were studied. In addition, the transformation between terrestrial and inertial reference frames was tested to integrate acceleration. The IAU 1976/1980 precession/nutation model showed a consistency of 0.05 mas with IAU 2000A model. Since the IAU 2000A model has a large number of nutation components, it took more time to compute the transformation matrix. The classical method with IAU 2000A model was two times faster than the NRO (non-rotating origin) approach, while there is no practical difference between two transformation matrices.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Navigation and Port Research Conference
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• v.1
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• pp.141-144
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• 2006

The deviations in the injection orbital parameters, resulting from launcher dispersions, need to be estimated and used for autonomous satellite operations. For the proposed small satellite mission of the university there will be two GPS receivers onboard the satellite to provide the instantaneous orbital state to the onboard data handling system. In order to meet the power requirements, the satellite will be sun-tracking whenever there is no imaging operation. For imaging activities, the satellite will be maneuvered to nadir-pointing mode. Due to such different modes of orientation the geometry for the GPS receivers will not be favorable at all times and there will be instances of poor geometry resulting in no output from the GPS receivers. Onboard the satellite, the orbital information should be continuously available for autonomous switching on/off of various subsystems. The paper presents the strategies to make use of small arcs of data from GPS receivers to compute the mean orbital parameters and use the updated orbital parameters to calculate the position and velocity whenever the same is not available from GPS receiver. Thus the navigation message from the GPS receiver, namely the position vector in Earth-Centered-Earth-Fixed (ECEF) frame, is used as measurements. As for estimation, two techniques - (1) batch least squares method, and (2) Kalman Filter method are used for orbit estimation (in real time). The performance of the onboard orbit estimation has been assessed based on hardware based multi-channel GPS Signal simulator. The results indicate good converge even with short arcs of data as the GPS navigation data are generally very accurate and the data rate is also fast (typically 1Hz).

• Journal of Advanced Navigation Technology
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• v.23 no.6
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• pp.535-541
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• 2019

In this paper, scripts for estimating the reference orbits of navigation satellites were developed and their performance was analyzed as a preliminary study for the development of the Korean GPS precise orbit determination technology. The JPL Flinn AC's data processing strategy was applied and Linux-based scripts were developed using GIPSY-OASIS. For the analysis of the accuracy of the estimated reference orbit, the precise orbit provided by the international GNSS data center was used as the truth. As a result, estimated satellite coordinates showed almost exactly same patterns and trends with the reference precise orbits, and their differences are in the range of ±2 cm. The average error between the two orbits was less than 1 cm in the 3D direction, while the standard deviation was also at 1 cm. From these, we found that the developed scripts have excellent performance in precise orbit determination.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.37 no.4
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• pp.237-247
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• 2020

The ground tracking support is a critical factor for the navigation performance of spacecraft orbiting around the Moon. Because of the tracking limit of antennas, only a small number of facilities can support lunar missions. Therefore, case studies for various ground tracking support conditions are needed for lunar missions on the stage of preliminary mission analysis. This study analyzes the ground supporting condition effect on orbit determination (OD) of Korea Pathfinder Lunar Orbiter (KPLO) in the lunar orbit. For the assumption of ground support conditions, daily tracking frequency, cut-off angle for low elevation, tracking measurement accuracy, and tracking failure situations were considered. Two antennas of deep space network (DSN) and Korea Deep Space Antenna (KDSA) are utilized for various tracking conditions configuration. For the investigation of the daily tracking frequency effect, three cases (full support, DSN 4 pass/day and KDSA 4 pass/day, and DSN 2 pass/day and KDSA 2 pass/day) are prepared. For the elevation cut-off angle effect, two situations, which are 5 deg and 10 deg, are assumed. Three cases (0%, 30%, and 50% of degradation) were considered for the tracking measurement accuracy effect. Three cases such as no missing, 1-day KDSA missing, and 2-day KDSA missing are assumed for tracking failure effect. For OD, a sequential estimation algorithm was used, and for the OD performance evaluation, position uncertainty, position differences between true and estimated orbits, and orbit overlap precision according to various ground supporting conditions were investigated. Orbit prediction accuracy variations due to ground tracking conditions were also demonstrated. This study provides a guideline for selecting ground tracking support levels and preparing a backup plan for the KPLO lunar mission phase.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.31-43
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• 1988

The differential correction process determining osculating orbital elements as correct as possible at a given instant of time from tracking data of artificial satellite was accomplished. Preliminary orbital elements were used as an initial value of the differential correction procedure and iterated until the residual of real observation (O) and computed observation(C) was minimized. Tracking satellite was NOAA-9 or TIROS-N series. Two types of tracking data were prediction data precomputed from mean orbital elements of TBUS and real data obtained from tracking 1.70 GHz HRPT signal of NOAA-9 using 5 meter auto-track antenna in Radio Research Laboratory. Accrding to thacking data either Gause method or Herrick-Gibbs method was applied to preliminary orbit determination. In the differential correction stage we used both of the Escobal(1975)'s analytical method and numerical method using f, g series for the comparision. The results between analytical and numerical ones are nearly consistent. And the differentially corrected orbit converged to the same value in spite of the differences between preliminary orbits of each time span.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.45-51
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• 1988

Most of all methods of determining the preliminary orbit of an artificial Earth satellite are reviewed. The preliminary orbits of the methorological satellite NOAA-10 are determined using the studied methods and are compared with mean orbital elements determined at NASA. Through the comparision the preliminary orbital elements determined with Gauss type methods are more approximate to those of NASA than those calculated with Laplacian type ones. Our results indicate that Taff(1984)'s criticism on the Gauss method must be abandoned and Marsden (1985)'s analysis on the method is correct.

• Journal of Positioning, Navigation, and Timing
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• v.10 no.4
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• pp.371-377
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• 2021

This research proposes the best combination of tropospheric delay models for Korean Positioning System (KPS). The overall results are based on real observation data of Japanese Quasi-Zenith satellite system (QZSS), whose constellation is similar to the proposed constellation of KPS. The tropospheric delay models are constructed as the combinations of three types of zenith path delay (ZPD) models and four types of mapping functions (MFs). Two sets of International GNSS Service (IGS) stations with the same receiver are considered. Comparison of observation residuals reveals that the ZPD models are more influential to the measurement model rather than MFs, and that the best tropospheric delay model is the combination of GPT3 with 5 degrees grid and Vienna Mapping Function 1 (VMF1). While the bias of observation residual depends on the receivers, it still remains to be further analyzed.