Robust optimization of nonlinear impulsive rendezvous with uncertainty

The optimal rendezvous trajectory designs in many current research efforts do not incorporate the practical uncertainties into the closed loop of the design. A robust optimization design method for a nonlinear rendezvous trajectory with uncertainty is proposed in this paper. One performance index related to the variances of the terminal state error is termed the robustness performance index, and a two-objective optimization model (including the minimum characteristic velocity and the minimum robustness performance index) is formulated on the basis of the Lambert algorithm. A multi-objective, non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm is employed to obtain the Pareto optimal solution set. It is shown that the proposed approach can be used to quickly obtain several inherent principles of the rendezvous trajectory by taking practical errors into account. Furthermore, this approach can identify the most preferable design space in which a specific solution for the actual application of the rendezvous control should be chosen.