Solving the Agile Earth Observation Satellite Scheduling Problem With Time-Dependent Transition Times

The scheduling of agile Earth observation satellites is to select a subset candidate targets each associated with profit during their visible time windows in order maximize the collected profits, under some operational constraints. For pair two consecutive observations, transition required perform rotating movement camera, depending on start times observations. This time-dependency significantly increases complexity problem. To solve this problem efficiently, we model time-dependent and prove that it satisfies first-in–first-out rule triangle inequalities rule. On basis, develop novel hybrid heuristic, called “greedy randomized iterated local search” (GRILS). A specific insert operator, including fast feasibility check an assignment procedure are specifically designed address constraints scheduling. Extensive experiments single satellite instances multisatellite demonstrate our algorithm outperforms state-of-the-art algorithms respect solution quality computation time.