Abstract: Boresight axis thermal stability indicates the star sensor’s capability to anti thermal change. Ground experiment and numerical simulation are the main approaches to analyze and verify this key performance. The simulation method is the primary one that can be used during the whole design period. An integrated method named thermalstructuraloptical analysis approach is developed to analyze the thermal stability of star sensor. This approach includes thermal, structural, optical analysis and thermal drift calculation. A high accuracy star sensor’s thermal stability is analyzed as an example. The results show the efficiency of this integrated method.

Key words: star sensor, thermal stability, simulation method