The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Oct. 17, 2000
Filed:
Jun. 29, 1999
James W Wehner, Torrance, CA (US);
TRW Inc., Redondo Beach, CA (US);
Abstract
The present invention provides a system (200) for determining the ephemeris of a space vehicle based on distances to and ephemeris of other spacecraft. An ephemeris determining subsystem (300) obtains ephemeris data (308) for one or more reference spacecraft. Distance information (306) is obtained between the space vehicle and the reference spacecraft. The spacecraft ephemeris (312) is then calculated with ephemeris determination algorithms (302) based on the ephemeris data (308) and distance information (306). Other available information, such as stored results of previous measurements and calculations, time (310), information from other on-board sensors and attitude information may be used to enhance the accuracy or decrease the complexity of the ephemeris determination.