LUNISAT ORBIT MAINTENANCE AND LOW-THRUST MANEUVERS
Lunisat represents a next-generation microsatellite aimed at orbiting the Moon, and equipped with dispensers for the release of nanosatellites. This research is focused on orbital dynamics of the main microsatellite, and specifically addresses orbit maintenance and low-thrust maneuvers. Nonsingular equinoctial orbit elements are employed for orbit propagations, in conjunction with numerical averaging. This is a powerful technique for the numerical integration of the mean elements, and allows substantial computational improvements.