MAE 298 SEMINAR: Logistics and Guidance, Navigation & Control (GNC) for Cislunar Assets

Abstract: Spearheaded by programs such as Artemis, Gateway and the Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS), interest in cislunar exploration is rapidly growing. The resulting increase in space traffic introduces new applications in areas such as rendezvous and proximity operations (RPO), positioning, navigation and timing (PNT), and space situational awareness (SSA) within the cislunar domain. The significantly larger distance from Earth, combined with increasing mission complexity and the demand for greater autonomy, calls for the development of design frameworks and algorithms specifically tailored for cislunar operations, both on the logistics front and the guidance, navigation and control (GNC) front. In this seminar, we will explore several topics across these two domains. First, we examine a logistics problem related to the design of a cislunar constellation for SSA, highlighting how a combinatorial challenge can be formulated and solved as a mixed-integer program. We then turn our attention to two GNC topics that are foundational for autonomous operations along libration-point orbits: optical navigation and station-keeping.

Bio: Yuri Shimane is an assistant professor in mechanical and aerospace engineering at UCI. Shimane received his M.Eng. in aeronautical engineering from Imperial College London with a year abroad at UCLA, and a Ph.D. in aerospace engineering from Georgia Tech. Prior to his academic appointment, he worked on commercial new-space projects, first at ispace in Tokyo, Japan, where he supported mission analysis for lunar exploration missions, and later at Infinite Orbits in Toulouse, France, where he developed guidance and control schemes for satellite life-extension missions in geostationary orbit. He has also led research collaborations with Mitsubishi Electric Research Laboratories (MERL) on cislunar guidance, navigation and control topics. Shimane has been part of a team representing the European Space Research and Technology Centre (ESTEC) in the Global Trajectory Optimization Competition (GTOC), placing second and fourth in the two most recent editions. He is the recipient of the John V. Breakwell Award at the 2025 AAS/AIAA Space Flight Mechanics Meeting.