This paper documents the results from the highly successful Lunar flashlight Optical Navigation Experiment with a Star tracker (LONEStar). Launched in December 2022, Lunar Flashlight (LF) was a NASA-funded technology demonstration mission. After a propulsion system anomaly prevented capture in lunar orbit, LF was ejected from the Earth-Moon system and into heliocentric space. NASA subsequently transferred ownership of LF to Georgia Tech to conduct an unfunded extended mission to demonstrate further advanced technology objectives, including LONEStar. From August-December 2023, the LONEStar team performed on-orbit calibration of the optical instrument and a number of different OPNAV experiments. This campaign included the processing of nearly 400 images of star fields, Earth and Moon, and four other planets (Mercury, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn). LONEStar provided the first on-orbit demonstrations of heliocentric navigation using only optical observations of planets. Of special note is the successful in-flight demonstration of (1) instantaneous triangulation with simultaneous sightings of two planets with the LOST algorithm and (2) dynamic triangulation with sequential sightings of multiple planets.

翻译：本文记录了使用星敏感器进行的月球手电筒光学导航实验（LONEStar）的丰硕成果。月球手电筒（LF）于2022年12月发射，是一项由NASA资助的技术验证任务。在推进系统异常导致无法进入月球轨道后，LF被弹射出地月系统并进入日心空间。随后，NASA将LF所有权转移至佐治亚理工学院，用于开展一项无额外资助的扩展任务，以演示包括LONEStar在内的更多先进技术目标。2023年8月至12月期间，LONEStar团队对光学仪器进行了在轨标定，并开展了多项不同的光学导航（OPNAV）实验。该实验活动处理了近400幅星场、地球与月球以及另外四颗行星（水星、火星、木星和土星）的图像。LONEStar首次实现了仅利用行星光学观测的日心空间导航在轨演示。尤为值得注意的是，成功完成了（1）使用LOST算法同时观测两颗行星实现瞬时三角定位，以及（2）利用多颗行星的连续观测实现动态三角定位的飞行演示。