SPACE APPLICATIONS OF GPS

G. B. Green and P. Axelrad

Peer Reviewed

Abstract:	The country’s space systems ground command and control network is rapidly becoming antiquated, and will not be able to handle the expansion of space traffic projected for the twenty-first century. There is a heavy reliance on vulnerable overseas ground locations that are not guaranteed. A cooperative satellite system architecture based on GPS would significantly alleviate the complexity of a future command and control structure. Specifically, if each satellite were to carry a GPS receiver as part of its telemetry, tracking, and command subsystem, all space vehicles could maintain accurate and reliable time, ephemeris, and pointing estimates. This satellite navigation and status data could then be transmitted on a regularly scheduled basis to a ground monitoring station or a Tracking and Data-Relay Satellite System (TDRSS) Satellite. In this way, normal operations would be reduced to merely reviewing the telemetered data. In case of anomalies in the data or a space emergency, a dwell mode would be initiated in which the ground segment would begin active tracking of the space vehicle. This paper outlines the structure of such a GPS-based cooperative satellite monitoring system.
Published in:	NAVIGATION: Journal of the Institute of Navigation, Volume 36, Number 3
Pages:	239 - 252
Cite this article:	Green, G. B., Axelrad, P., "SPACE APPLICATIONS OF GPS", NAVIGATION: Journal of The Institute of Navigation, Vol. 36, No. 3, Fall 1989, pp. 239-252.
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