Investigation into SINS/ANS Integrated Navigation System Based on Unscented Kalman Filtering

Strapdown inertial navigation system (SINS) integrated with astronavigation system (ANS) yields reliable mission capability and enhanced navigational accuracy for spacecrafts. The theory and characteristics of integrated system based on unscented Kalman filtering is investigated in this paper. This Kalman filter structure uses unscented transform to approximate the result of applying a specified nonlinear transformation to a given mean and covariance estimate. The filter implementation subsumed here is in a direct feedback mode. Axes misalignment angles of the SINS are observation to the filter. A simple approach for simulation of axes misalignment using stars observation is presented. The SINS error model required for the filtering algorithm is derived in space-stabilized mechanization. Simulation results of the integrated navigation system using a medium accuracy SINS demonstrates the validity of this method on improving the navigation system accuracy with the estimation and compensation for gyros drift, and the position and velocity errors that occur due to the axes misalignments.