Abstract: A method, apparatus and system for controlling an attitude of a spacecraft, the spacecraft including an attitude control system operatively associated with a ground-based spacecraft control system. According to an exemplary embodiment, the spacecraft attitude control system uses a B-spline interpolator for commanding the spacecraft. The methods and systems disclosed herein can be implemented in, for example, executable machine code and/or integrated circuit hardware.

Abstract: A method and system for generating an optimal trajectory path tasking for an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) for collection of data on one or more collection targets by a sensor on the UAV.

Abstract: The invention relates to route planning and optimization. In some embodiments, the invention includes obtaining vertex data describing target attributes, including at least one target location, and process dynamics data describing system constraints of a process; defining vertex functionals, describing attribute requirements, and edge functionals, which use the system constraints to determine cost requirements, for cost objectives; and using the data, the functionals, and the cost objectives to construct a T-graph that includes a label space representing the target attributes. Next, the T-graph is solved to construct a label space trajectory by determining waypoints such that the process (1) travels through all target locations and (2) satisfies the attribute requirements, dynamically calculating travel cost by applying the cost requirements to each intervening edge, and minimizing the travel cost according to the cost objectives.

Abstract: A method and system for generating an optimal trajectory path tasking for an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) for collection of data on one or more collection targets by a sensor on the UAV.

Abstract: A method, apparatus and system is provided for reducing an amount of information transmitted to a vehicle in order to implement attitude control of the vehicle. In accordance with the present invention, data corresponding to at least one time-varying attitude command trajectory defining an attitude of the vehicle is reduced, for example, into a vector of polynomial coefficients. The vector of polynomial coefficients then are transmitted to the vehicle, where they are used to reconstruct the at least one time-varying attitude command trajectory via a polynomial interpolation operation.

Abstract: A method, apparatus and system is provided for reducing an amount of information transmitted to a vehicle in order to implement attitude control of the vehicle. In accordance with the present invention, data corresponding to at least one time-varying attitude command trajectory defining an attitude of the vehicle is reduced, for example, into a vector of polynomial coefficients. The vector of polynomial coefficients then are transmitted to the vehicle, where they are used to reconstruct the at least one time-varying attitude command trajectory via a polynomial interpolation operation.