Thales Alenia Space Italia S.p.a. Con Unico Socio

Giorgio Fasano

Fulvio Bresciani

Stefano Ferroni

Mario Pessana

Enrico Gaia

An optical flow odometer to determine the position of an object movable relatively to a surface is provided that includes a cluster of digital image sensors intended to be arranged on the movable object at respective reference positions and an electronic processing and control unit electrically connected with the digital image sensors and configured to: operate the digital image sensors in subsequent time instants during movement of the movable object so as to carry out a sequence of multiple digital image capture operations, in each of which the digital image sensors are operated to simultaneously capture respective digital images, and receive from the digital image sensors and process the digital images captured in the multiple digital image capture operations to compute either the positions of the individual digital image sensors or the position of the cluster of digital image sensors at one or more of the multiple digital image capture operations, and compute the position of the movable object at one or more multiple digital image capture operations based on either the positions of one or more individual digital image sensors or the position of the cluster of digital image sensors computed at one or more multiple digital image capture operations.

Optical flow odometry based on optical mouse sensor technology

An on-orbit servicing spacecraft includes an engagement system to engage a space vehicle or object to be serviced or tugged, so as to form a space system, and an electronic reaction control system to cause the spacecraft to rotate about roll, yaw, and pitch axes to control attitude and displacement along given trajectories to cause the spacecraft to carry out given maneuvers. The electronic reaction control system includes (i) a sensory system to directly sense physical quantities or allow physical quantities to be indirectly computed based on sensed physical quantities, including one or more of position, attitude, angular rates, available fuel, geometrical features, and on-board systems state, (ii) attitude control thrusters mounted so as to allow their positions and orientations to be adjustable, and (iii) an attitude control computer in communication with the sensory system and the attitude control thrusters and programmed to receive data from the sensory system and to control, based on the received data, positions, orientations, and operating states of the attitude control thrusters so as to control attitude and position of the spacecraft. The attitude control computer is programmed to cause the spacecraft to carry out a given mission including an engagement step, in which the engagement system and the attitude control thrusters are controlled by the attitude control computer to engage a space vehicle or object to be serviced or tugged, and one or more operating steps, in each of which the attitude control thrusters are controlled by the attitude control computer to meet one or more requirements established for the operating step.

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Turin, Italy

Giorgio Fasano