Distributed space debris tracking with consensus labeled random finite set filtering

Space debris tracking is a challenge for spacecraft operation because of the increasing number of both satellites and the amount of space debris. This paper investigates space debris tracking using marginalized δ-generalized labeled multi-Bernoulli filtering on a network of nodes consisting of a collection of sensors with different observation volumes. A consensus algorithm is used to achieve the global average by iterative regional averages. The sensor network can have unknown or time-varying topology. The proposed space debris tracking algorithm provides an efficient solution to the key challenges (e.g., detection uncertainty, data association uncertainty, clutter, etc.) for space situational awareness. The performance of the proposed algorithm is verified by simulation results.