An Enhanced TSP-Based Approach for Active Debris Removal Mission Planning

• João Batista Rodrigues Neto UNISINOS
• Gabriel de Oliveira Ramos UNISINOS

Resumo

The extensive exploration of the Low Earth Orbit (LEO) has created a dangerous spacial environment, where space debris has threatened the feasibility of future operations. In this sense, Active Debris Removal (ADR) missions are required to clean up the space, deorbiting the debris with a spacecraft. ADR mission planning has been investigated in the literature by means of metaheuristic approaches, focused on maximizing the amount of removed debris given the constraints of the spacecraft. The state-of-the-art approach uses an inver-over and maximal open walk algorithms to solve this problem. However, that approach fails to deal with large instances and duration constraints. This work extends the state of the art, increasing its performance and modeling all the constraints. Experimental results evidence the improvements over the original approach, including the ability to run for scenarios with thousands of debris.

Palavras-chave: Time-dependent traveling salesman problem, Space debris, Active debris removal, Genetic algorithm