Nonlinear attitude control for a rigid spacecraft by feedback linearization

Abstract

Attitude control law design for spacecraft large angle maneuvers is investigated in this paper. The feedback linearization technique is applied to the design of a nonlinear tracking control law. The output function to be tracked is the quaternion attitude parameter. The designed control law turns out to be a combination of attitude and attitude rate tracking commands. The attitude-only output function, therefore, leads to a stable closed-loop system following the given reference trajectory. The principal advantage of the proposed method is that it is relatively easy to produce reference trajectories and associated controller.