Long-term Bounded Satellite Formation Flying around Mars and the Martian Moons

The interest in the Martian system has increased over the past decades, as more studies indicate that Mars was once habitable and may preserve subsurface lakes. Establishing long-term bounded satellite formation flying about Mars is an important effort in the exploration of the Martian system. In this research, we focused on the dynamics around Mars and the Martian Moons, as a part of that effort. In this talk, we will discuss three endeavours taken for modelling and analysing different regions in the Martian system. One region is beyond the radii of the Martian moons. This is the first study to model the long-term dynamics in such an environment. The second region is low Mars orbits. In this region, we focused on establishing long-term bounded satellite formation flying around Mars. The third region is the vicinity of the Martian moons, Phobos and Deimos. Studying the dynamics nearby the Martian moons can provide important information on the evolution of science orbits for Martian moon exploration. In that context, we focused on finding the exact location of the libration points adjacent to the moons – where potential exploration spacecraft can reside in a stable position or a periodic orbit.