As space traffic in the Earth’s vicinity continues to grow rapidly, cislunar space is emerging as the next frontier of space exploration. To support its sustainable utilisation, the development of robust and cost-effective End-of-Life (EoL) disposal strategies is of primary importance. In this work, unstable manifold trajectories generated from two Halo orbits, one at L1 and one at L2 of the Earth-Moon (EM) system, are propagated within the coupled Circular Restricted Three Body Problem (CR3BP) framework. Maps describing the outcomes of disposal trajectories as a function of the phase angle and the relative phase between the EM and Sun-Earth (SE) systems at manifold insertion are presented for the cases under analysis. Finally, a subset of these trajectories is identified as viable disposal options and further refined accordingly, providing estimates of the Zero Velocity Curves (ZVCs) closure cost for heliocentric disposal options, as well as impact locations, velocities, and angles for lunar impacts and Earth re-entries.
Cislunar end-of-life strategies based on an aware usage of the key dynamical objects
Elisa Maria Alessi;
2026
Abstract
As space traffic in the Earth’s vicinity continues to grow rapidly, cislunar space is emerging as the next frontier of space exploration. To support its sustainable utilisation, the development of robust and cost-effective End-of-Life (EoL) disposal strategies is of primary importance. In this work, unstable manifold trajectories generated from two Halo orbits, one at L1 and one at L2 of the Earth-Moon (EM) system, are propagated within the coupled Circular Restricted Three Body Problem (CR3BP) framework. Maps describing the outcomes of disposal trajectories as a function of the phase angle and the relative phase between the EM and Sun-Earth (SE) systems at manifold insertion are presented for the cases under analysis. Finally, a subset of these trajectories is identified as viable disposal options and further refined accordingly, providing estimates of the Zero Velocity Curves (ZVCs) closure cost for heliocentric disposal options, as well as impact locations, velocities, and angles for lunar impacts and Earth re-entries.I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
