Patent ID: 8457810

Claim:
A method for application of a compound steering law for efficient low thrust transition orbit trajectory for a spacecraft, the method comprising: calculating, with at least one processor, a desired orbit for the spacecraft; calculating, with the at least one processor, a velocity change required to achieve an orbit eccentricity that corresponds to the desired orbit for the spacecraft; calculating, with the at least one processor, a velocity change required to achieve a semi-major axis that corresponds to the desired orbit for the spacecraft; calculating, with the at least one processor, a direction of a vector sum of the velocity change required to achieve the orbit eccentricity and the velocity change required to achieve the semi-major axis; and firing at least one thruster of the spacecraft in the direction of the vector sum in order to change a current orbit of the spacecraft to the desired orbit for the spacecraft, thereby changing the orbit eccentricity and the semi-major axis simultaneously.