Ihi Corporation

Kyushu University

Ihi Aerospace Co., Ltd.

Institute for Q-shu Pioneers of Space, Inc.

Yukihito Kitazawa

Aritsune Kawabe

Toshiya Hanada

Shinya Morita

Mitsuharu Sonehara

Kozue Hashimoto

Akira Sakurai

Masaru Uji

Katsuaki Nomura

Ayumi Nakanishi

Provided are a space debris removing device and a method which enable easy installation of a deceleration device to space debris undergoing a tumbling motion. The space debris removing device includes: a propulsion device () for performing approach and attitude control on target debris (); a capture device () having a harpoon () which can be ejected toward the target debris (); an observation device () for calculating a capture position (E) and a capture attitude at which the harpoon () can be driven into a tank () (hollow portion) of the target debris () by observing a motion of the target debris (); a deceleration device () directly or indirectly connected to the harpoon (), for decelerating the target debris (); and a body part () on which the propulsion device (), the capture device (), the observation device (), and the deceleration device () are mounted.

Space debris removing device and space debris removing method

Disclosed is a method for clearing space debris in geocentric orbit, wherein, in geocentric orbit, a spatial region having a greater resistive force than atmosphere in the geocentric orbit is provided, space debris passing through the spatial region is decelerated by the resistive force, and the decelerated space debris is dropped from the geocentric orbit.

Method for clearing space debris

A method of detecting space debris includes: generating a virtual space debris in accordance with the law of conservation of mass by applying a debris breakup model to an object of breakup origin; calculating an orbit of each virtual space debris based on a debris orbit propagation model; and generating appearance frequency distribution of a motion vector of each virtual space debris on the celestial sphere based on the orbit calculation. The above operations are executed multiple times. The method further includes setting a search range vector based on a motion vector having a high level of the appearance frequency distribution of the motion vector, and applying a stacking method to regions in images captured at time intervals during the fixed point observation, the regions being shifted along the search range vector sequentially in the order of capture, thereby detecting space debris appearing on the images.

Method of detecting space debris

Growing community of inventors

Tokyo, Japan

Yukihito Kitazawa