Control-Oriented Deep Space Communications For Unmanned Space Exploration

TL;DR

This paper proposes a communication optimization scheme for a specific cooperation system named the “mother-daughter system”, and finds that the proposed scheme demonstrates equivalence to the max-min rate scheme for time-insensitive control tasks.

Abstract

In unmanned space exploration, the cooperation among space robots requires advanced communication techniques. In this paper, we propose a communication optimization scheme for a specific cooperation system named the "mother-daughter system". In this setup, the mother spacecraft orbits the planet, while daughter probes are distributed across the planetary surface. During each control cycle, the mother spacecraft senses the environment, computes control commands and distributes them to daughter probes for actions. They synergistically form sensing-communication-computing-control ($\mathbf{SC^3}$) loops. Given the indivisibility of the $\mathbf{SC^3}$ loop, we optimize the mother-daughter downlink for closed-loop control. The optimization objective is the linear quadratic regulator (LQR) cost, and the optimization parameters are the block length and transmit power. To solve the nonlinear mixed-integer problem, we first identify the optimal block length and then transform the power allocation problem into a tractable convex problem. We further derive the approximate closed-form solutions for the proposed scheme and two communication-oriented schemes: the max-sum rate scheme and the max-min rate scheme. On this basis, we analyze their power allocation principles. In particular, for time-insensitive control tasks, we find that the proposed scheme demonstrates equivalence to the max-min rate scheme. These findings are verified through simulations.

Figures (9)

• Figure 1: Illustration of the "mother-daughter system" in unmanned space exploration.
• Figure 2: Illustration of an unmanned space cooperation system that comprises a mother spacecraft and multiple daughter probes. The spacecraft and probes synergistically form $\mathbf{SC^3}$ loops, and each $\mathbf{SC^3}$ loop takes charge of a control-type subtask.
• Figure 3: Curves of the achievable rate in the FBL regime, i.e., $r(\gamma)$, its first derivative, i.e., $\triangledown r(\gamma)$, and second derivative, i.e., $\triangledown^2 r(\gamma)$. Related parameters are set as: $\epsilon=10^{-6}$ and $n=30$ for the left figure, and $\epsilon=10^{-6}$ and $n=80$ for the right figure.
• Figure 4: Comparisons of the LQR cost under the accurate solution and the proposed closed-form solution.
• Figure 5: Comparisons of the LQR cost under three control-oriented schemes.

Theorems & Definitions (3)

• Theorem 1
• Theorem 2
• Theorem 3