Orbital Mechanics Projects
The Pennsylvania State University – Dr. Robert Melton
3D kinematics, rigid-boy dynamics, orbits, and orbital maneuver problems
September 2021 – December 2021
This course introduced me to astronautics topics and presented several orbital mechanics projects that required MATLAB scripts and simulations to solve.
Background
AERSP 309 was a junior-level Astronautics course that covered 3D kinematics, rigid-boy dynamics, orbits, and orbital maneuvers. There were several projects and assignments that required Matlab to develop solutions to problems related to the course topics.
Projects included:
- Writing a script that converts a satellite’s position and velocity from its own reference frame to the Earth’s reference frame
- Use Matlab to calculate several orbital elements and the three classical orbital angles to evaluate location in the 2D orbital plane
- Use of Euler Parameters to describe reference frame orientation
- Given limited orbital element information, find the rest of the data