A practical view to database generation of star identification algorithm for space applications

Nowadays, star trackers are widely used in satellites and spacecraft for three-axis attitude estimation. Star trackers are the most accurate instrument among the others. A Star tracker is made up of hardware and software (firmware). The software (firmware) is a set of algorithm that runs in a microprocessor. These algorithms include centroiding, star identification and attitude determination. Star identification algorithm needs a database to identify stars in the image. In this paper, we describe a novel method of constructing database by considering practical issues. We discuss about main catalog, base catalog, database and ordering it to improve the speed of star identification algorithm. This database was used in our star identification algorithm.