A super-twisting sliding mode control in a backstepping setup for rendezvous with a passive target

The general context of this paper is the assessment of Sliding Mode Control (SMC) techniques for rendezvous missions in space. Based on the so called block-controllable model form, a Super-Twisting SMC is proposed in a backstepping setup. The proposed methodology is applied to a high-fidelity benchmark that accurately simulates a rendezvous mission between a chaser spacecraft and a passive target onto a circular orbit around Earth, taking into account the coupling between attitude and translational motions, propellant sloshing, modes of the flexible appendages and the most dimensioning space disturbances (e.g. second zonal harmonic J₂, atmospheric drag, magnetic disturbance). Nonlinear simulations demonstrate the potential of the proposed approach.