Distributed Anti-disturbance Cooperative Attitude Takeover by Multiple Spacecraft

This study investigates the spacecraft attitude takeover through multiple small satellites under inertia matrix uncertainties and external disturbance. Firstly, we separate the unknown part of the inertia matrix of the combined spacecraft and reconstruct it as equivalent disturbance together with the external disturbance. Then the disturbance was estimated by a novel distributed disturbance observer (DOB) using each satellite’s local measurements and neighbor torque information, and a consensus compensation term was introduced in the disturbance estimation process to enhance estimation consistency across the network. Finally, leveraging the DOB outputs, a distributed attitude takeover controller is developed to achieve attitude tracking without explicitly identifying the inertia matrix. Numerical simulations validate the method, demonstrating efficacy of attitude tracking, disturbance rejection and cooperative ability.