Camera Resolution and Trajectory Correction Campaign Cost for Cislunar Optical Navigation

Increasing cislunar mission activity places growing demand on limited ground-based tracking in- frastructure, motivating interest in autonomous navigation techniques such as optical navigation (OpNav). While prior work has examined OpNav performance in cislunar space and optimized trajectory correction maneuver (TCM) placement, the impact of camera resolution on navigation performance and propellant cost has not been explicitly quantified. This paper presents a camera resolution trade study for autonomous OpNav along an impulsive translunar injection to lunar orbit insertion trajectory modeled in the circular restricted three-body problem (CRTBP). Three camera configurations are evaluated using a linear covariance extended Kalman filter with variable-range pointing vector measurements to quantify the relationship between camera resolution, TCM authoriza- tion, and correction cost. Monte Carlo analysis demonstrates that camera resolution determines not only whether a TCM can be authorized, but when, with the high-resolution camera authorizing nearly three days earlier than lower-resolution configurations, enabling a four-burn correction campaign that delivers the spacecraft to within 1.10 km at a median total ∆V of 0.57 m/s.