MS, University of Cincinnati, 2015, Engineering and Applied Science: Aerospace Engineering

The problem of landing a small spacecraft on the surface of an asteroid is analyzed in this thesis. The main effort of the thesis is focused around developing a fuzzy logic system to act as the controller. The fuzzy logic system is paired with a genetic algorithm to optimize the controller's membership functions. This optimized controller is then compared with two established controllers: an Optimal Control approach, and a Multiple Sliding-Surfaces Guidance algorithm. The genetic-fuzzy approach presented is applicable to designing controllers for various spacecraft and asteroid profiles.

Committee: Grant Schaffner Ph.D. (Committee Chair); Kelly Cohen Ph.D. (Committee Member); Elad Kivelevitch Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Aerospace Materials