Observation Timing Planning Method for Sequential Images of Autonomous Navigation Based on Observability

To reduce the computational burden of image processing during the planetary landing autonomous navigation, the observability of sequential image-based autonomous navigation is analyzed, and an observation timing planning method is proposed. The minimum number of the observations to make the state observable in unknown environments is obtained from the observability analysis, which is the boundary condition for switching landmarks. On this basis, the optimal observation time interval is obtained by optimizing the constructed depth estimation error model, so that the observation timing can be planned adaptively and the number of image processing can be reduced. The simulation results verify the correctness of the observability analysis results and the effectiveness of the proposed observation timing planning method, which effectively reduces the number of landmark observations by 45. 9% without significantly affecting the navigation accuracy compared with the observing landmarks at each sampling moment. It is shown that the proposed method can effectively reduce the computational burden of the onboard image processing algorithm and greatly improve the autonomous navigation capability of the planetary lander in unknown environments based on sequential images. © 2023 China Spaceflight Society. All rights reserved.