Book excerpt: Rigid Body Dynamics for Space Applications explores the modern problems of spaceflight mechanics, such as attitude dynamics of re-entry and space debris in Earth's atmosphere; dynamics and control of coaxial satellite gyrostats; deployment, dynamics, and control of a tether-assisted return mission of a re-entry capsule; and removal of large space debris by a tether tow. Most space systems can be considered as a system of rigid bodies, with additional elastic and viscoelastic elements and fuel residuals in some cases. This guide shows the nature of the phenomena and explains the behavior of space objects. Researchers working on spacecraft attitude dynamics or space debris removal as well as those in the fields of mechanics, aerospace engineering, and aerospace science will benefit from this book. - Provides a complete treatise of modeling attitude for a range of novel and modern attitude control problems of spaceflight mechanics - Features chapters on the application of rigid body dynamics to atmospheric re-entries, tethered assisted re-entry, and tethered space debris removal - Shows relatively simple ways of constructing mathematical models and analytical solutions describing the behavior of very complex material systems - Uses modern methods of regular and chaotic dynamics to obtain results