A digital twin modeling method of atmospheric pressure control system for manned space docking

Establishing a right atmospheric pressure environment is first for astronauts to enter from the visiting vehicle to the target spacecraft in manned space docking and the atmospheric pressure control system plays an integral role in the whole process. However, the judgment of the system’s operation state still strongly depends on the experience of ground support technologists. This paper proposes a novel companion flight method for atmospheric pressure control system in manned space docking based on digital twin modeling. The modeling approach contains three main elements as basic theory, modeling tool and model realization, where basic theory provides mathematical description of the system behavior, modeling tool gives modeling support such as modeling language and environment, model realization contains detail modeling and simulation steps. Experiment results showed that the digital twin model calculation data can well follow the real telemetry data. In each stage of the docking atmospheric pressure control process, the error between the calculated output and the real one is less than 5%. The proposed method provides a digitalize way for atmospheric pressure control system in manned space docking and can be extended to various similar systems, when the control objects place in remote areas.