Influence of the electric induction drag on the orbit of a charged satellite moving in the ionosphere (solution by the method of the average value)
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Abstract
The secular effects of the electric induction drag on the orbit of a charged satellite moving in the ionosphere are examined by the method of average values. The first solutions are obtained under the assumption of non-rotation of the Earth; the second solutions are obtained assuming rotation of the Earth. In the first case the semi-major axis exhibits secular variation, but the other orbital elements exhibit no secular variation. In the second case both semi-major axis and eccentricity exhibit secular variation, but the other orbital elements exhibit no secular variation. It can be shown that the semi-major axis is contracted due to the action of the electric induction drag if the satellite has enough charge in the ionosphere. The eccentricity is decreased gradually with time, but its variation is very small for the case of a rotating Earth. An example is presented in which the secular effects of the electric induction drag on the orbits of a charged satellite are calculated. The numerical results are given in Table 1 and a discussion of them is presented in Table 2.
Keywords
Electric induction drag Ionosphere Charged satellite Orbital influence1 Introduction
As an artificial satellite pass through the ionosphere where there exists a great number of electrons and ions, these particles ions and electronics collide with the satellite to produce a drag. This drag is termed Coulomb drag. Chapra (1961) gave a formula for Coulomb drag. The author Li (2011a) studied the effect of Coulomb drag on the orbital elements of an artificial satellite moving in the ionosphere. If the satellite is electrically charged or the satellite is a metallic conductor while in the ionosphere, the mutual action of the charged satellite with the electric field produces an electric induction drag. Waytt (1960) obtained the formula for the electric induction drag, but that paper did not determine of it on the orbit of a charged satellite. The present paper studies the secular effect of the electric induction drag on the orbit of a charged satellite by using the method of average value.
2 The electric induction drag and the components of the perturbation acceleration of a charged satellite on the elliptic orbit
Here the symbols \(a\) and \(e\) denote the semi-major axis and eccentricity respectively, \(n\) is the mean motion, and \(f\) is the true anomaly. The second terms in the right hand show the effect of the rotation of the Earth.
3 Solution for the case of non-rotation of the Earth and orbital inclination of the satellite
4 Solution for the case of rotation of the Earth and inclination of the orbit of the satellite
Numerical results
| Effects | ȧ | ė | ω̇ | ϖ̇ | i̇ | Ω̇ | \(\dot{\varepsilon}_{0}\) | \(\dot{T}_{S}\) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| (m/d) | (/d) | (rad/d) | (rad/d) | (rad/d) | (rad/d) | (rad/d) | (s/d) | |
| Case 1 | ||||||||
| Non-rotation | −8.36 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | −0.01 |
| Case 2 | ||||||||
| Rotation | +0.13 | 2.15 × 10−8 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | +1.65 × 10−4 |
| Sum | ||||||||
| Total values | −8.23 | +2.15 × 10−8 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | −0.0098 |
In Case 1 the results are obtained from the formula (15), and in Case 2 the results are obtained from formula (24).
5 Discussions and conclusions
5.1 Discussions
- (1)
When we do not consider the rotation of the Earth, the results of Eqs. (15) give the variation of the orbital semi-major axis except all other orbital elements are without variation. When we consider the rotation of the Earth, the results of Eqs. (24) give the variation of the orbital semi-major axis and eccentricity: all other orbital elements are without variation.
- (2)
If we consider the case of rotation of the Earth and the inclination there exist variation of the eccentricity and of the semi-major axis even though their variation is very small, if the satellite moves along the equator of the Earth (\(\cos i = 1\)), the effect is largest. If the satellite moves along a meridian circle (\(\cos i = 0\)), the perturbation effect is zero.
- (3)
In this paper we adopt the method of average value to study this topic because the factor \((1+e^{2} + 2e \cos f)^{-1/2}\) in the expressions (10) for the perturbation functions \(S\) and \(T\) becomes unwieldy, even when expanded. For this reason this paper uses the method of average value which is rather easy and simple.
- (4)
In this paper the orbital effects only consider electric field, the effects of the magnetic field are not considered. The charged or conductive satellite moves in the magnetic field-free ionosphere according to the formula of drag given by Waytt (1960)
- (5)
Comparison of the effect of electronic induction drag with that of neutral atmospheric drag at the same altitude.
If we consider neutral atmospheric drag, the variable rate of the semi-major axis may be calculated from the formula for the atmospheric drag (Zheng and Ni 1989)$$\begin{aligned} \frac{da}{dt}& = - \frac{2\pi}{ T_{S}}k_{S}a^{2} \rho_{0}\exp \bigl[\beta (r_{0} - a)\bigr] \\ &\quad\times \biggl[I_{0} + 2eI_{1} + \frac{3}{4}e^{2}(I_{0} + I_{2}) + \cdots \biggr]. \end{aligned}$$(26)and based on Kepler’s third law$$\begin{aligned} \frac{de}{dt} &= - \frac{2\pi}{T_{S}}k_{S}a \rho_{0}\exp \bigl[ \beta (r_{0} - a) \bigr] \biggl[I_{0} + \frac{1}{2}e(I_{0} + I_{2}) \\ &\quad + \frac{1}{4}e^{2}( - 5I_{1} + I_{3}) \ldots \biggr]. \end{aligned}$$(27)We consider the satellite at an altitude of 500 km and use data given by Allen (1973) \(H=80,\beta = 1/80\). \(\log\rho_{0} = - 15.2~\mbox{g/cm}^{3}\ (\rho_{0} = 3.60 \times 10^{ - 13}~\mbox{kg/m}^{3})\), \(k_{S} = \lambda C_{D}S/m_{S} = 0.5585~\mbox{m}^{2}\mbox{/kg}\) (\(\lambda = 1\), \(C_{D} = 2.1,S = \frac{1}{4}\pi R^{2}\), \(m_{S} = 45~\mbox{kg}\)), \(r_{0} = 6371 + 500 = 6871~\mbox{km}\), \(R_{E} = 6371~\mbox{km}\), \(a = 7250~\mbox{km}\), \(\exp\beta (r_{0} - a) = 0.00876\), \(x = \beta ae= 2.2656 > 1\), \(T_{S} =102~\mbox{min}\). So we use the following formula for \(I_{n}(x)\) (Watson 1952; Li 2011b)$$ \frac{dT_{S}}{dt} = \frac{3}{2}\frac{T_{S}}{a}\frac{da}{dt}. $$(28)Substitution of \(x\) into the above formula, yields: \(I_{0} = 2.6990\), \(I_{1} = 1.5584\), \(I_{2} = 0.9641\), \(I_{3} =0.2827\). Substituting the above data into the above formulae (26), (27) and (28), we obtain the numerical results for the variable rate of semi-major axis and eccentricity. We can therefore compare the results for the electric induction drag with the atmosphere drag as shown in Table 2. It can be seen from Table 2 that the effect of electric induction drag is large compare with that of neutral atmosphere drag$$\begin{aligned} I_{n}(x) &= \frac{\exp x}{\sqrt{2\pi x}} \biggl\{ 1 - \frac{4n^{2} - 1}{1!((8x)} \\ &\quad + \frac{(4n^{2} - 1)(4n^{2} - 3^{2})}{1!2!(n + 1)(n + 2)} - \ldots \biggr\} . \end{aligned}$$(29)Table 2Comparison of the electric induction drag with atmospheric drag and Coulomb drag
Effects
Electric induction drag
Coulomb drag
Atmospheric drag
ȧ (m/d)
−8.23
−2.44
−39.79
ė (/d)
0 +2.15 × 10−8
−2.11 × 10−9
−5.42 × 10−6
\(\dot{T}_{S}\) (s/d)
−0.0098
−0.003
−0.05
- (6)
Comparison of the effect of the electric induction drag with that of Coulomb drag.
The formulae for the variable rate of the semi-major axis and eccentricity due to the action of Coulomb drag in the ionosphere was presented previously (Li 2011a):$$\begin{aligned} &\frac{da}{dt} = - 2C_{Di}\frac{(\pi R_{S})^{2}}{m_{S}T_{S}}a^{2}(m_{i}N_{i}) \biggl(1 + \frac{3}{4}e^{2}\biggr), \end{aligned}$$(30)$$\begin{aligned} &\frac{de}{dt} = - 2C_{Di}\frac{(\pi R_{S})^{2}}{m_{i}T_{S}}ae(m_{i}N_{i}), \end{aligned}$$(31)$$\begin{aligned} &\frac{dT}{dt} = \frac{3}{2}\biggl(\frac{P}{a}\biggr) \frac{da}{dt}. \end{aligned}$$(32)
We can see from Table 2 that the effect of electric induction drag is smaller than that of atmospheric drag and larger than that of Coulomb drag on the rates of the semi-major axes and periods; The effect of electric induction drag is larger than that of Coulomb drag and smaller than that of the atmospheric drag for eccentricity rates in the same ionosphere.
5.2 Conclusion
We conclude that in the case of non- rotation of the Earth, the semi-major axis contracts gradually with time due to the electric induction drag, but does not have significant effect on eccentricity and inclination of the orbit as indicated in formula (15). In the case of rotation of the Earth, however, the semi-major axis and eccentricity increase gradually with time, but the increase is very small, and other orbital elements: argument or longitude of perigee, mean longitude at epoch, orbital inclination and ascending node exhibit no secular variation.
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