Tomasz Zubowicz, POLSA; Mikolaj Kruzynski, POLSA; Krzysztof Arminski, POLSA; Mikolaj Karawacaki, POLSA; Krzysztof Szyszka, POLSA; Marcin Teofilewicz, POLSA; Artur Makarewicz, POLSA; Edwin Wnuk, POLSA; Zygmunt Aniol, POLSA; Tymoteusz Trocki, POLSA
Keywords: sensor network, telescope array, observation strategies
Abstract:
The challenges of the safety of space operations, sustainability of assets, and security in the space domain are still growing, driven by technological, commercial as well as geopolitical changes. This leads to the development and improvement of existing sensor network together with its associated processing software. These activities introduce tangible and justified added value to services and are the first major step towards higher space surveillance, tracking, and situational awareness.
This paper demonstrates the capabilities of the Polish sensor network (POLON) developed by the Polish Space Agency (POLSA). The network comprises six sensor locations composed of twenty-two configurations in total. These include western and eastern Australia, South Africa, Chile, continental United States, and Hawaii. Each site can act as a mesh-based single sensor or a group of individual instruments. The sensors are composed of telescopes with about thirty centimeters (about 11.81 in) of aperture on quick mounts capable of tracking even the fastest satellite objects and equipped with modern CMOS cameras. The former one is obtained algorithmically and enables to obtain a performance-to-cost balance, delivering field of view surveillance capabilities. The latter promotes simultaneous multi-object observations. The sensor network is remotely operated and maintained by the sensor operator under the Ops-Tech division of the POLSA Department of Space Safety.
The study primarily compares the sensor performance and effectiveness of observations utilizing well-defined indicators in various operating modes including survey and tracking. These include, i.e., number of (unique) objects observed and tracks generated, (mean) observation arc length, revisiting time, timelines, and accuracy interpreted based on root means square error (RMS).
Observational data required to perform these analyses was collected during several observation campaigns. To compare results, independent observations were performed simultaneously with four identical telescope configurations available at specified sensor location. Each telescope is equipped with astrometry algorithms (along with synthetic tracking), storage and transmission mechanisms, to ensure seamless operation. This setup provides configurable field(s) of view, possibility to set the telescope along given trajectories or track objects with a certain shift at using multiple fields of view. Therefore, such a system enables the use of sophisticated observation strategies and experimental comparison of the performance of individual observation strategies during execution of different tasks.
Observations were carried out for space objects in LEO, MEO, and GEO. The conducted experiments include, e.g., high yield observation generation, GEO belt scanning, effective observations of LEO satellites. Apart from the selected survey and tracking strategies the conducted experiments indicate the benefits of invoking synthetic tracking within the context of this sensor network.
In particular, the research team leveraged a unique scenario where identical telescopes were situated at a specific location. Two telescopes were dedicated to conducting observations in survey mode, while the remaining two operated in tracking mode, simultaneously observing the same objects. The analysis also includes careful planning for the observational campaign, considering various orbital regimes.
The results of this study provide concise description of the architecture of the POLON network and illustrate the effectiveness and performance of the POLON sensor network, indicating the effectiveness for precise space object observations.
Date of Conference: September 17-20, 2024
Track: SDA Systems & Instrumentation