Guidance and Control Engineer
A Guidance and Control engineer is responsible for designing, developing, and implementing systems that guide and control vehicles, spacecraft, or other dynamic systems to achieve desired trajectories, orientations, or objectives. Their primary role is to ensure the stability, accuracy, and safety of the vehicle's or system's operation.
keys Roles and Responsibility
Guidance System Design: These engineers design the algorithms and systems that determine the optimal path and trajectory for the vehicle to reach its target or desired destination. They take into account various factors, such as mission objectives, environmental conditions, vehicle dynamics, and constraints.
Control System Design: Guidance and control engineers design the control systems that steer or adjust the vehicle's attitude, position, or velocity to follow the desired trajectory. They use feedback control techniques to stabilize the vehicle and maintain its desired state.
Flight Dynamics Analysis: They analyze the flight dynamics of the vehicle, including stability and controllability characteristics, to ensure the system responds appropriately to disturbances and control inputs.
Sensor Integration: Guidance and control engineers work with sensor specialists to integrate sensors, such as gyroscopes, accelerometers, GPS receivers, and cameras, into the guidance and control systems to provide accurate real-time information about the vehicle's state and surroundings.
Simulation and Modeling: These engineers use computer simulations and mathematical models to evaluate the performance of the guidance and control systems under various conditions and optimize their design.
Autonomous Systems: For autonomous vehicles or spacecraft, guidance and control engineers develop algorithms that enable the vehicle to make decisions and adjust its trajectory or behavior without human intervention.
Real-Time Implementation: Guidance and control engineers implement their designs into real-time embedded systems, ensuring the algorithms run efficiently on the vehicle's onboard computer. They ensure that the guidance and control systems meet stringent safety and reliability requirements to minimize the risk of accidents or failures during operation.
Coordination with Navigation Systems: They collaborate with navigation engineers to fuse data from different sensors and navigation systems to provide accurate and robust vehicle position and orientation estimates. Guidance and control engineers work with mission planners to develop trajectory plans that meet mission objectives while considering fuel efficiency, time constraints, and other factors.
Mission Analysis: They analyze mission scenarios and requirements to determine the appropriate guidance and control strategies for different phases of the mission. These engineers conduct extensive testing and validation to verify the performance and accuracy of the guidance and control systems through simulations, hardware-in-the-loop tests, and flight tests.
Software Skills
Matlab - Feedback Control Design, Root-locus and Frequency Response
Matlab - Kalman Filter Design & Estimation Techniques
Technical Skills
Basics of Orbital Mechanics
Understanding of Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS)