Dual Quaternion Kalman Filtering and Observability Analysis for Satellite Relative Navigation With Line-of-Sight Measurements

This article is concerned with the development of two novel Kalman filters for satellite relative pose estimation. The relative pose, which is represented by a dual quaternion, is estimated from noisy lines-of-sight via a single camera, along with biases of linear velocity and angular rate measurements. The constraints on the dual quaternion are handled by brute-force and virtual measurement techniques. The partial reset analysis shows how to propagate the estimation error biases and covariances. Closed-form expressions for the Jacobians are provided. A quantitative observability analysis for the position states is provided. Compared with traditional representations, the dual quaternion model increases the position observability by a factor of four for each line-of-sight. The additive dual quaternion model enhances the observability of the rotation states thanks to a specific coupling term in the pose dynamics. Extensive Monte-Carlo simulations of a flight formation case verify that the proposed novel filters are asymptotically unbiased and statistically consistent for all practical purposes. They outperform the other candidate estimators in particular during the transient phase. The numerical simulations validate the observability analysis.

Automated summary

This article introduces two novel Kalman filters for satellite relative pose estimation. By handling the constraints of dual quaternion and using observability analysis, accurate estimation of relative pose can be achieved. Numerical simulations validate that the proposed filters have good performance in practical applications.