Advances in materials science, especially improved stiffness-to-weight ratios of structural components, are driving aerospace innovations. However, counteracting those lighter-weight improvements is an increase in cable use, driven by growing demands for data and power transmission. 

“As a result, accurately incorporating the effects of cable dynamics into the modeling of these structures has become crucial,” said Armaghan Salehian, associate professor of mechanical and mechatronics engineering at the University of Waterloo in Canada. 

Considering that cables can account for nearly one-third of spacecraft weight, detailed modeling of their stiffness and damping is of great importance to future aerospace design. It is therefore critical to have accurate lightweight space structural models, especially for control algorithms.