Welcome to pykep’s documentation!

pykep is a coolbox developed at the European Space Agency by its Advanced Concepts Team. Its main purpose is to allow for fast prototyping of research ideas on interplanetary trajectory design. At the library core is the implementation of efficient algorithms allowing to solve the multiple revolutions Lambert’s problem, low-thrust problems, multiple asteroid randezvous problems and more. Support for JPL SPICE, SGP4 propagation and the Heyoka Taylor integration suite is provided.

pykep has been used by the European Space Agency’s Advanced Concepts Team during different Global Trajectory Optimization Competitions GTOC, several research papers as well as for the optimization of preliminary mission scenarios such as in the M-ARGO interplanetary cubesat concept, the phase 0 study for the the Titan and Enceladus Mission (TandEM) and for preliminary mission analysis of the HERA mission.

Main

• API
  • Anomalies Conversions
  • Global constants
  • Orbital Elements
  • Epoch class
  • Lambert class
  • Fly-by routines
  • Interplanetary transfer legs
  • Planet class
  • User defined planets (UDPLAs)
  • Numerical Propagation
  • Taylor adaptive propagators
  • Trajectory Optimization
  • Trajectory Optimization Gym
  • The plot module
• Bibliography

Tutorials

• Basic
  • The various anomalies in pykep
  • Epochs and Julian Dates
  • Ephemerides
  • Interfacing to SPICE and JPL DE ephs
  • Lagrange Propagation
  • The Sims-Flanagan trajectory leg
  • The Sims-Flanagan high-fidelity trajectory leg
  • Plotting
• Trajectory Optimization
  • Point to point low-thrust
  • Planet to planet low-thrust
  • Multiple Gravity Assist (MGA)