Autonomous Path Estimation for a Descent Vehicle Using Recursive Gaussian Filters

Abstract

This paper considers a refinement problem for the flight altitude, speed, and flight-path angle of an aircraft during aerodynamic deceleration in the atmosphere of Mars using inaccurate discrete g-load measurements. For solving this problem, several suboptimal discrete nonlinear filters of higher accuracy than the extended Kalman filter based on the Taylor linearization procedure with static (Gaussian) linearization of the nonlinearities are applied and compared with each other. The equations of these filters are derived, the Gaussian moments of their structural functions are calculated, and the resulting accuracy of these filters is analyzed in statistical terms.