Operation mode design of multi-FOV star sensor

Two operation modes, namely high precision operation mode and high update operation mode, were designed in view of the characteristics of the multi-filed of view(FOV) star sensor. The central timing controller accomplish its operation mode configuration according to the instructions and starts image acquisition and processing module in the appropriate timing. With the timing characteristics of operation mode, the multi-FOV image fast centroid extraction in two operation modes was achieved by designing in field programmable gate array (FPGA) three centroid extraction modules, which implement simultaneously with their own corresponding image acquisition modules. The operation mode configuration and data update rate were tested on the experimental platform which was designed based on FPGA, with IBIS5-A-1300 of Cypress as the image sensor. Results show that the star sensor can be configured and switched normally and flexibly through the instructions, and that the data update rate is up to three times of that of the traditional star sensor.