Journal of Systems Engineering and Electronics ›› 2026, Vol. 37 ›› Issue (2): 687-696.doi: 10.23919/JSEE.2026.000094

• CONTROL THEORY AND APPLICATION • Previous Articles    

Cooperative guidance method for seeker-less missile and beacon aircraft

Zhengxin TAO1,2(), Shifeng ZHANG1,2,*()   

  1. 1College of Aerospace Science and Engineering, National University of Defense Technology, Changsha 410073, China
    2Hunan Provincial Key Laboratory of Aerospace Cross-Domain Flight Vehicle System and Control Technology, Changsha 410073, China
  • Received:2024-04-29 Online:2026-04-18 Published:2026-04-30
  • Contact: Shifeng ZHANG E-mail:taozhengxin18@nudt.edu.cn;zhangshifeng@nudt.edu.cn
  • About author:
    TAO Zhengxin was born in 2000. He received his B.E. degree in missile engineering in 2018 from National University of Defense Technology, China, where he is currently working towards his M.S. degree in aeronautical and astronautical science and technology. His research interests include overall design and system analysis of aircraft. E-mail: taozhengxin18@nudt.edu.cn

    ZHANG Shifeng was born in 1971. He received his B.E., M.E., and Ph.D. degrees in guidance and control from National University of Defense Technology. He is currently a professor with the College of Aerospace Science and Engineering, National University of Defense Technology. His research interest is active disturbance rejection control of aircraft. E-mail: zhangshifeng@nudt.edu.cn

Abstract:

To solve the problem of the precise strike for seeker-less missile, a cooperative guidance method of seeker-less missile and the beacon aircraft is proposed. Firstly, the guidance law considering the miss distance and line-of-sight (LOS) angle constraint is designed to achieve the precise strike on the target and satisfy the LOS angle constraint. On this basis, the tangential load of the beacon aircraft is designed to ensure that the remaining flight time (time-to-go) for the missile and the beacon aircraft converge to the same value within a finite time, thus the seeker-less missile can indirectly strike the target precisely. Simulation results validate the effectiveness of the proposed method in addressing the problem of cooperative strike on target, and compared with the cooperative guidance method in reference, the proposed cooperative guidance method is better in strike accuracy and demand overload.

Key words: seeker-less missile, beacon aircraft, cooperative guidance law, time-to-go