Determination of target relative position and range by PSD optical sensor system

Theoretical and experimental studies on the determination of the spacecraft relative position, range and angle for the spaceflight rendezvous and docking were conducted by PSD (position sensitive detector) optical sensor system. The PSD system is based on measurement method of three GaAlAs lasers and projective geometry principle. It consists of target and receiver including optical head, A/D converter and computer processing system etc. The system accuracy of ranging is 0.02m, and those of the azimuth and angle determining are 0.176° and 0.182°, respectively.