Nuclear Powered Lunar Prospector

The folks at Carnegie Mellon’s Robotics Institute have come up with another unique robot creation.

The Scarab is a 4-wheel robot is designed for prospecting on the Moon. The design has been optimized for drilling into rock in cold and dark environments.

The drill in the center of the robot body can drill out a core sample up to meter deep. The body is shaped so the relatively small drilling robot - only 250 kgs ( 550 lbs) - can get enough weight on the bit to drill.

The Scarab can run in the dark bottoms of moon craters with its nuclear power source. The advanced sterling radioisotope generator (ASRG) converts the emissions from a radioactive isotope to electricity. According to the article the generator can provide 100 watts of power for 10 years.

The robot has a laser navigation system so it can see the local terrain in the dark and find its way around.

So far NASA does not have have any specific plans for sending the Scarab to the moon but the robot is being used to test technologies for the task.

There is no mention if CMU is thinking of fielding a team for the $30 million Google Lunar robot X-prize.


The Tartan Online : 'Scarab' the robot

Robot Colonists on the Moon

The folks at NASA JPL Evolvable Hardware Laboratory have been working on robot companions for the next round of travel to the moon.

They have reasoned that the best mechanical helpers would be humanoid robots. They feel that robots shaped like humans - with arms, legs and stereo vision - are the best partners for construction and everyday living on the moon and Mars.
They admit that there is need for "extension" robots which extend human capabililties for sensing, strength and super-human capabilitites. But there is also a need for "replacement" robots which can do all that humans can and more.
Humanoid robots are the best form for replacement robots. Some advantages of humanoid robots are:

-Humanoids are able to operate in human environments
-They can use the same tools as humans
-They can climb ladders and scaffolding
-They can help humans directly in emergencies

Also
- Humans can interact woith them more easily
- Humans accept the familiar shape more readily
- There is highest efficiency in teaching and learning new skills

The training and learning are among the most important considerations for companion robots in space colonies, they conclude. Robots cannot be programmed for everything, they must be able to learn how to adapt and optimize their skills.

One of the key factors of the robot's success may depend not on their ability to learn but on the human's ability to teach. We must be able to pass new skills to robots (and from robot to robot) by training them through demonstration and imitation and not by trying to write millions of lines of code.

Starting in 2004 the group has been using a Fujitsu HOAP-2 (Humanoid for Open Architecture Platform) for development.
They have been able to get the 50 cm tall guy to recognize objects and colors and do simple moving tasks. They aim is to get the robots to complete simple construction tasks. The next big step would be to upsize to a full-scale humanoid like SARCOS creation, for example.

When will humanoid robots be our helpers in space?

They have outlined a timeline of humanoid development to match the NASA 'Vision for Space Exploration' established in 2004:

2023- 2030 Include humanoid robot technology in some space missions

2028 - Humanoids assist in lunar habitat assembly

2033 - Humanoid robots build habitats without human intervention

2040 - Robots perform site selection, sample collection and laboratory analysis of samples.

2050 - Robot colonists run large scale commercial mining operations including processing materials, transporting to Earth and energy production.

It seems a long way to robot colonies from today's ability to optimize a walking algorithm on a 2-foot tall robot doll. Robot baby steps.


Humanoid Project

SARCOS high performance humanoid videos
Fujitsu HOAP-2 videos
related: Fujitsu Announces HOAP-3

NASA Ames To Lead Robots To Moon

NASA Ames Leads Robotic Lunar Exploration Program

Today, on the 36th anniversary of Apollo 12, the second manned lunar landing, NASA announced that it has assigned management of its Robotic Lunar Exploration Program to NASA Ames Research Center in California's Silicon Valley.
Returning astronauts to the moon will start with robotic missions between 2008 and 2011 to study, map and learn about the lunar surface. The assignment marks a rebirth of robotic space flight work at NASA Ames, which has a history of spearheading unmanned space launches.

Returning robots, and then astronauts, to the moon provides opportunities to develop and mature technologies needed for long-term survival on other worlds, according to scientists.

NASA - NASA Ames Leads Robotic Lunar Exploration Program

NASA Challenge: Robot, Bring Me Moon Dust

Digging "Moon Dirt" is NASA's Fifth Centennial Challenge

NASA today announced the Regolith Excavation Challenge, a new California Space Education and Workforce Institute (CSEWI).

The Regolith Excavation Challenge will award the prize money to the team that can design and build autonomously operating systems to excavate lunar regolith, or "moon dirt," and deliver it to a collector.
"Excavation of lunar regolith is an important and necessary step toward using the resources on the moon to establish a successful base for life on its surface," said NASA's acting Associate Administrator for the Exploration Systems Mission Directorate, Douglas R. Cooke. "The unique physical properties of the lunar regolith make excavation a difficult technical challenge," he added.



NASA - Digging "Moon Dirt" is NASA's Fifth Centennial Challenge

Lunar penguin robots to hop across the Moon

Robotic space penguin to hop across the Moon
NewScientist.com news service
Will Knight

The first lunar colonists may not be a humans but compact robots capable of jumping more than a kilometre in a single bound.

Engineers at US defence contractor Raytheon, in Massachusetts, have developed a robot, dubbed the Lunar Penguin, that could one day bounce across perilous craters and imposing mountains on the Moon's craggy surface using a set of compact rocket boosters.
"Since we could set it down in such a precise location, the Penguin could be the delivery vehicle for the science community," Raytheon engineer Karleen Seybold, who is leading the Penguin project, told Reuters.

The Lunar Penguin was publicly demonstrated for the first time on Tuesday at the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics' 2005 SPACE Conference and Exhibition in California, US.

...the Lunar Penguin's unique approach to lunar locomotion could prove a useful way of exploring the Moon’s hostile landscape. "If it's successful, perhaps we could find astronauts on the next manned Moon mission using the same system to jump over hills," he says.

New Scientist Breaking News - Robotic space penguin to hop across the Moon

India Dreams of Robots on Moon

ISRO plans to put a 'robot on the moon'

A robotic arm sent to the moon to bring back samples? That is what Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) is dreaming to do in space exploration next.

"It is only a dream at this stage. If it takes off at all, it will take time to fructify," ISRO Chairman G Madhavan Nair said on the sidelines of an international conference on planetary exploration and space law in Bangalore.

The project, according to Nair, will cost around Rs 10-15 billion. That is almost three to four times the expense of the `Chandrayaan-1' mission to moon project, which ISRO has slated for 2007-08. "But it is possible. We will need the support of the scientific community and the government," Nair says.

The Astronautical Society of India (ASI), in association with International Academy of Astronautics (IAA) and the International Institute of Space Law (IISL), is organizing a twin-event - IAA Asia-Pacific Regional Conference on "Advances in Planetary Exploration" and the IISL Space Law Conference - 2005 on "Bringing Space Benefits to the Asian region" at Bangalore during 26-29 June.

ISRO plans to put a 'robot on the moon'

Indian Robots will not be alone:

Robots Prepare Moon for Colonists
Japanese Robots to Mine Moon
Chinese Robots for Lunar Exploration

Robots To Survey Moon Before Colonists

Prospecting for Lunar Water
science@NASA

Whether a moonbase will turn out to be feasible hinges largely on the question of water. Colonists need water to drink. They need water to grow plants. They can also break water apart to make air (oxygen) and rocket fuel (oxygen+hydrogen). Furthermore, water is surprisingly effective at blocking space radiation. Surrounding the 'base with a few feet of water would help protect explorers from solar flares and cosmic rays.

Colonists arriving on moon


To find out if lunar ice is truly there, NASA plans to send a robotic scout. The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, or "LRO" for short, is scheduled to launch in 2008 and to orbit the Moon for a year or more. Carrying six different scientific instruments, LRO will map the lunar environment in greater detail than ever before.

Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter

"This is the first in a string of missions," says Gordon Chin, project scientist for LRO at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. "More robots will follow, about one per year, leading up to manned flight" no later than 2020.


Prospecting for Lunar Water

China works out robot series for lunar exploration

Sounds like a sort of mobile robot tribe. I wish I could find a picture, the description is very confusing. "a triangular wheel for independent walking and skipping obstacles"??

Complete article:
China works out robot series for lunar exploration

Chinese scientists say they have worked out a group of secondary robots which resemble wheels of a vehicle to carry out exploration missions on the moon.

The robot series are an array of independently-controlled, concurrent and reconfigurable secondary robots, each consisting of an arm for carrying objects, collecting samples, surveying and mapping, and a triangular wheel for independent walking and skipping obstacles, said a spokesman for the Automation Institute of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS).

The institute, based in Shenyang, capital of northeast China's Liaoning Province, is the independent developer of the robots which have passed the appraisal test by the Chinese government.

These secondary robots are like wheels of the moon rover, which is also made up of a primary robot, the bodywork of the vehicle, said the CAS spokesman who declined to be named.

"The system will begin working when all the secondary robots' arms are linked to the primary robot, and a precise positioning system will help the whole system achieve concurrent and automatic operation," he said. "The secondary robots can be sent to different missions collecting data or removing any obstacle and automatically return to the main system."

The reconfigurable system will play a leading role in China's future explorations to the moon or other planets, he said.

The Chinese government has also announced its plan to launch a satellite to orbit the moon by 2007 as part of China's three-stage lunar project. Moreover, the country plans to land an unmanned rover on the Moon for collecting Lunar soil samples around 2020.

People's Daily Online -- China works out robot series for lunar exploration