Origin identification of sub-millimeter-sized debris from in-situ debris measurements

Abstract

This study introduces a new method to estimate the orbital parameters (inclination, nodal precession rate, and right ascension of the ascending node) of the broken-up object using in-situ debris measurements. To reduce collision probability with tiny debris generated from breakups of satellites, it is required to identify the origin of breakups and predict the orbit of debris. In general, small debris cannot be tracked from the ground, thus an in-situ measurement is an effective method to detect sub-millimeter-sized debris. Previous studies developed a method to identify the location of breakup origin from an in-situ measurement, however, it can be applied to an ideal situation where the detection occurs at the intersection of the orbit planes. This study introduces a new method to estimate the orbital parameters by fitting the model of geocentric declination to the measurement data. This method can be applied to practical situations that cannot be validated in previous studies. This paper also adopts iteratively reweighted least squares to improve estimation accuracy and mitigate initial value dependencies.