An optimal guidance law for controlling the acceleration component perpendicular to the line-of-sight

A guidance law that enables controlling the acceleration component of the missile perpendicular to the line-of-sight (LOS) is proposed. The guidance law enables the missile to maintain a maneuver advantage over the target, close to interception. The problem is posed in the linear optimal control framework and a closed form guidance law is derived for any linear missile dynamics. The guidance law enables the missile to impose a predefined angle between its velocity vector and the LOS. The performance of the proposed guidance law is evaluated in a non-linear two dimensional simulations. It is shown that the acceleration component of the missile perpendicular to the LOS can be successfully imposed without forgoing its intercept capability. It is also demonstrated that in a non-perfect information setting the proposed guidance law provides an improvement in the miss distance, when compared to the same guidance law without controlling the acceleration component perpendicular to the LOS.