Guidance for Hypersonic Reentry Using Nonlinear Model Predictive Control and Radau Pseudospectral Method

ABSTRACT This paper examines the application of the nominal‐trajectory‐based guidance approach for hypersonic reentry vehicles. The nonlinear model predictive control (NMPC) method is adopted to track the nominal trajectory. In particular, the NMPC is formulated in continuous time and solved using the pseudospectral method. Then, a terminal constraint set is scaled to ensure recursive feasibility via an optimization problem. The sufficiency conditions for nominal stability are given with a nonlinear model. Linearizing the terminal states, an approximated stability condition is given based on the linear matrix inequality (LMI). A numerical simulation is presented to verify the validity of the proposed approach.