Event-Triggered Intermittent Prescribed Performance Control for Spacecraft Attitude Reorientation

Abstract: This paper focuses on the issue of how to realize spacecraft attitude control with guaranteed performance while conspicuously reducing the actuator acting frequency simultaneously. The prescribed performance control (PPC) scheme is often employed for the control with guaranteed performance. However, conventional PPC controllers are designed from the perspective of continuous system, which contradicts the "discrete" control logic in actual spacecraft control system, and such a problem limited the application value of PPC scheme in actual applications. In order to significantly lower the actuator acting frequency while still maintaining the desired performance, a composite event-trigger mechanism is proposed for this issue, turning off the actuator and eliminating unnecessary control output under appropriate conditions. Further, the proposed composite event-trigger mechanism is combined with a prescribed performance control scheme, constructing a complete controller structure for solving the presented issue. Meanwhile, a special performance function is designed to provide mild transition process. Based on the proposed scheme, a specific backstepping controller is further developed as a validation. Finally, numerical simulation results are presented to validate the effectiveness of the proposed scheme.