Attitude control

Attitude control is controlling the orientation of an object with respect to an inertial frame of reference or another entity (the celestial sphere, certain fields, nearby objects, etc.).

Controlling vehicle attitude requires sensors to measure vehicle orientation, actuators to apply the torques needed to re-orient the vehicle to a desired attitude, and algorithms to command the actuators based on (1) sensor measurements of the current attitude and (2) specification of a desired attitude. The integrated field that studies the combination of sensors, actuators and algorithms is called "Guidance, Navigation and Control" (GNC).