Multitype satellite observation, including optical observation satellites, synthetic aperture radar (SAR) satellites, and electromagnetic satellites, has become an important direction in integrated satellite applications due to its ability to cope with various complex situations. In the multitype satellite observation scheduling problem (MTSOSP), the constraints involved in different types of satellites make the problem challenging. This article proposes a mixed-integer programming model and a generalized profit representation method in the model to effectively cope with the situation of multiple types of satellite observations. To obtain a suitable observation plan, a deep reinforcement learning-based genetic algorithm (DRL-GA) is proposed by combining the learning method and genetic algorithm. The DRL-GA adopts a solution generation method to obtain the initial population and assist with local search. In this method, a set of statistical indicators that consider resource utilization and task arrangement performance are regarded as states. By using deep neural networks to estimate the $Q$ value of each action, this method can determine the preferred order of task scheduling. An individual update strategy and an elite strategy are used to enhance the search performance of DRL-GA. Simulation results verify that DRL-GA can effectively solve the MTSOSP and outperforms the state-of-the-art algorithms in several aspects. This work reveals the advantages of the proposed generalized model and scheduling method, which exhibit good scalability for various types of observation satellite scheduling problems.

Earth electromagnetic exploration satellites are widely used in many fields due to their wide detection range and high detection sensitivity. The complex environment and the proliferating number of satellites make management a primary issue. In this paper, a learning adaptive genetic algorithm (LAGA) is proposed for the Earth electromagnetic satellite scheduling problem (EESSP). Control parameters are essential to the successful performance of evolutionary algorithms, and their sensitivity to the problem makes tuning parameters very time-consuming. In the LAGA, a gated recurrent unit (GRU) neural network model is used to control the parameters of variation operators. The neural network model is capable of leveraging real-time information to achieve dynamic parameter adjustment during population search. Moreover, a policy gradient-based reinforcement learning method is utilized to update the parameters of GRU. An adaptive evolution mechanism is employed in LAGA for the autonomous selection of crossover operators. Additionally, the heuristic initialization method, elite strategy, and local search method are incorporated into LAGA to enhance overall performance. Simulation experiments demonstrate the effectiveness of LAGA in solving the EESSP. This study highlights the advantages of utilizing reinforcement learning to optimize neural network models for controlling genetic algorithm searches. Learning adaptive planning methods can effectively address complex problem scenarios and enhance satellite scheduling system performance.

Earth observation satellites (EOSs) are taking a large number of pictures with increasing resolution which produce massive image data. Satellite data transmission becomes the bottleneck part in the process of EOS resource management. In this paper, we study the earth observation satellite integrated scheduling problem (EOSIS) where the imaging activities and download activities are considered integratively. We propose an integer linear programming model to formulate the problem. Due to the NP-hardness of the problem, we propose an efficient local search heuristic (ELSH) to solve problems of large size. ELSH uses a dedicated local search method to guarantee algorithm performance and efficient constraint handling mechanisms to guarantee algorithm efficiency. Numerical experimental results show that the algorithm demonstrates excellent performance on a set of benchmark instances. The ELSH achieves optimal results for all small-size instances (with 50 targets, two satellites, and three ground stations), and is very robust for large instances with up to 2000 targets. Moreover, the proposed ELSH easily dominates the state-of-the-art algorithm.