Radiative Heat Fluxes in Orbital Space Flight

The heat exchange between a spacecraft and its environment is an important factor determining the thermal regime of the spacecraft. In this work, we collected, sorted, and supplemented well-known algorithms for calculating the external thermal effect on a spacecraft in a near-planet orbit (of arbitrary planet of the Solar system). We present a technique of determination of external radiative heat fluxes on an arbitrarily oriented spacecraft surface, based on trajectory data. The influence of the spacecraft rotation about a longitudinal axis on the heat fluxes is considered. The results of numerical simulations are presented in the paper.