Space debris and NEAs research at IFAC-CNR

Space debris and NEAs research at IFAC-CNR Alessandro Rossi IFAC CNR, Pisa, Via Madonna del Piano 10, Sesto Fiorentino Italian Workshop on SSA Rome, July, 9-10, 2012

Collaborators Giovanni B. Valsecchi, IAPS-INAF, giovanni@iaps.inaf.it E. Dotto (INAF-OAR), F. Piergentili (UniRoma I), S. Marinoni (ASI-SDC) Department of Mathematics, University of Pisa ISTI CNR Two post-docs will be hired between end of 2012 and first half of 2013 on EU contracts.

Space debris SARA, TELAD: ESA-SSA contracts for the development of network of optical surveillance systems for high-leo orbits based on the fly-eye telescope by CGS (Prime: CGS) Collaboration with SpaceDyS S.r.l. in the framework of ESA-SSA Allerta Spaziale per Infrastrutture Critiche - EU Prevention, Preparedness and Consequence management of Terrorism and Other Security related Risks CIPS (Prime Telespazio S.p.A.) Stardust: EU Marie Curie Network on space debris removal and NEAs mitigation (Prime: University of Strathclyde)

Near Earth Asteroids Impact risk estimation, mathematical models for collision probability computation (with INAF-IAPS and SpaceDyS s.r.l.)(see Valsecchi presentation) Study of physical properties of small bodies of the Solar System (with INAF-OAR) Orbital and rotational dynamics of asteroids Space missions to NEAs (design and science at target)(e.g. MarcoPolo-R)

Experience and results International Committees and Working Groups Inter-Agency Space Debris Coordination Committee (IADC): member of the WG2 ( Environment Modelling and Databases )(Chairman from 2004-2006) Technical Team SCI-229 (TASK GROUP) on Space Environment Support to NATO Space Situational Awareness Member of ESA SSA User Representatives Group for the Space Situational Awareness panel.

Experience and results Long term evolution of the space debris environment, mitigation measures studies with SDM: first studies in 1993 (Rossi et al., JGR, 1994) more than 30 papers on the subject... 4 large ESA-ESOC contracts for the development of SDM and the long term simulations

Experience and results A. Rossi, IFAC-CNR Italian Workshop on SSA Collision risk evaluation for space assets and dynamical evolution of the debris clouds: Iridium collision dynamics (Rossi, Farinella and Valsecchi, Nature, 399, pp. 743-744 (1999). Medium Earth Orbit: GNSS orbital stability. disposal strategies and collision risk 6000 4000 6000 2000 4000 0 2000 2000 0 2000 4000 4000 6000 6000

Experience and results Preliminary orbit determination methods(with UniPi and SpaceDyS) ESA-ESOC Contract on GEO observations from ESA Space Debris Telescope: building of a GEO catalogue from scratch using non-optimized optical observations. The innovative methods and software developed by UniPi allowed the determination of six-parameters orbits from a standard data set of optical observations.

Experience and results Preliminary orbit determination methods(with UniPi and SpaceDyS) ESA-ESOC Contract on GEO observations from ESA Space Debris Telescope: building of a GEO catalogue from scratch using non-optimized optical observations. The innovative methods and software developed by UniPi allowed the determination of six-parameters orbits from a standard data set of optical observations. No a priori information nor simplified assumptions (such as circular orbits) were required,

Experience and results Preliminary orbit determination methods(with UniPi and SpaceDyS) ESA-ESOC Contract on GEO observations from ESA Space Debris Telescope: building of a GEO catalogue from scratch using non-optimized optical observations. The innovative methods and software developed by UniPi allowed the determination of six-parameters orbits from a standard data set of optical observations. No a priori information nor simplified assumptions (such as circular orbits) were required, The observation strategy was completely independent from the design of the methods and not optimized for their use.

Experience and results Preliminary orbit determination methods(with UniPi and SpaceDyS) ESA-ESOC Contract on GEO observations from ESA Space Debris Telescope: building of a GEO catalogue from scratch using non-optimized optical observations. The innovative methods and software developed by UniPi allowed the determination of six-parameters orbits from a standard data set of optical observations. No a priori information nor simplified assumptions (such as circular orbits) were required, The observation strategy was completely independent from the design of the methods and not optimized for their use. Even the most demanding cases of high A/M objects were successfully treated.

Experience and results Preliminary orbit determination methods(with UniPi and SpaceDyS) SARA optical network of fly-eye telescopes: able to complement radar from 1200 km to 2000 km of altitude down to 5 cm All the numbered orbits are accurate enough to allow follow up obs. with no trailing loss. The orbit accuracy from the improved orbits is compliant with the accuracy envelope of collision avoidance requirements. The network of telescopes is able to detect and catalog the fragments generated by a catastrophic event just a few days after the event.

Experience and results Physical characterization of space debris in the GEO region First Italian photometric and spectroscopic measurements of space debris objects in GEO with the 1.5 Loiano (INAF-Osservatorio Astronomico di Bologna) telescope. 3 Reflectance 2.5 2 1.5 METEOSAT7 METEOSAT9 SICRAL1 SL12 28240 SL12 26397 90085 1 0.5 0.4 0.45 0.5 0.55 0.6 0.65 0.7 0.75 0.8 0.85 Wavelength (microns)

Software, instruments and tools First Italian photometric and spectroscopic measurements of space debris objects in GEO with the 1.5 Loiano (INAF-Osservatorio Astronomico di Bologna) telescope.

Software and tools Space Debris Mitigation (SDM 4.1) is a debris environment long term evolution model first developed in the early 90 s and constantly upgraded since then under ESA-ESOC contracts. It is one of the few worldwide existing software able to realistically model the long term evolution of the space debris population. Ancillary models include: orbital propagators collision risk estimation algorithms...

Improvement Parallel hardware Multi-core computers: easy, relatively cheap Software (SDM) upgrade: man-power: difficult, expensive 1 man year A telescope with differential tracking (i.e., able to follow a slowly moving target in non-sidereal motion) would be useful to obtain spectra of near GEO objects. Loiano at present does not have this capability. Other small-medium size telescopes in Italy have it and we will try to apply for observing time.

European SSA System

European SSA System

European SSA System Criticality index = ancillary information on European TLEs Cloud dynamics = collision avoidance filtering Catalogue building and maintenance procedures with advanced orbit determination algorithms (with UniPi and SpaceDyS s.r.l.)

AoB Active debris removal simulations will be performed in the IADC collaborative framework, with SDM 4.1 IFAC-CNR is part of the Stardust EU Marie Curie consortium: Active Debris removal simulation will be one of the main tasks Medium Earth Orbit: GNSS (Galileo) management and mitigation strategies.