Paper Session III-C - Earth Dividends From the Development of Space Vehicle Robotics: Technologies and Techniques

This paper identifies and describes advanced robotics technologies and novel applications of state-of-the-art techniques which presently focus on space-related missions but which could result in other dividends on Earth. The paper has three sections. The first section focuses on the development of technology to help NASA automate the reprocessing of low-Earth-orbit vehicles. These advanced technologies include vibration isolation for robot arms and end-effectors, automated handling of fuels and other hazardous materials, and automated safety systems for process control. The second section describes the use of state-of-the-art solid modeling techniques to assist in the design of a robot arm, camera systems, sensors, and platforms for characterizing and exploring a planetary terrain. The third section discusses the use of these advanced technologies and novel applications to provide dividends on Earth in both space- and nonspacerelated applications. Vibration isolation could improve the performance of long manipulator arms used for vehicle processing and cleaning Department of Energy waste tanks. Automated handling of hazardous fluids could help automate the fueling of commercial and passenger vehicles. The advanced safety circuit could enhance many chemical process control operations. Modeling techniques for designing terrain exploration systems could assist the design of vehicles for exploring the many sites on Earth where human entry may be unsafe or inefficient, such as nuclear waste sites, military sites with unexploded ordnance, and widespread geological and agricultural surveys

Ground Robotic Hand Applications for the Space Program study (GRASP)

This document reports on a NASA-STDP effort to address research interests of the NASA Kennedy Space Center (KSC) through a study entitled, Ground Robotic-Hand Applications for the Space Program (GRASP). The primary objective of the GRASP study was to identify beneficial applications of specialized end-effectors and robotic hand devices for automating any ground operations which are performed at the Kennedy Space Center. Thus, operations for expendable vehicles, the Space Shuttle and its components, and all payloads were included in the study. Typical benefits of automating operations, or augmenting human operators performing physical tasks, include: reduced costs; enhanced safety and reliability; and reduced processing turnaround time

Towards Advanced Robotic Manipulations for Nuclear Decommissioning

Despite enormous remote handling requirements, remarkably very few robots are being used by the nuclear industry. Most of the remote handling tasks are still performed manually, using conventional mechanical master‐slave devices. The few robotic manipulators deployed are directly tele‐operated in rudimentary ways, with almost no autonomy or even a pre‐programmed motion. In addition, majority of these robots are under‐sensored (i.e. with no proprioception), which prevents them to use for automatic tasks. In this context, primarily this chapter discusses the human operator performance in accomplishing heavy‐duty remote handling tasks in hazardous environments such as nuclear decommissioning. Multiple factors are evaluated to analyse the human operators’ performance and workload. Also, direct human tele‐operation is compared against human‐supervised semi‐autonomous control exploiting computer vision. Secondarily, a vision‐guided solution towards enabling advanced control and automating the under‐sensored robots is presented. Maintaining the coherence with real nuclear scenario, the experiments are conducted in the lab environment and results are discussed

A lightweight, high strength dexterous manipulator for commercial applications

The concept, design, and features are described of a lightweight, high strength, modular robot manipulator being developed for space and commercial applications. The manipulator has seven fully active degrees of freedom and is fully operational in 1 G. Each of the seven joints incorporates a unique drivetrain design which provides zero backlash operation, is insensitive to wear, and is single fault tolerant to motor or servo amplifier failure. Feedback sensors provide position, velocity, torque, and motor winding temperature information at each joint. This sensing system is also designed to be single fault tolerant. The manipulator consists of five modules (not including gripper). These modules join via simple quick-disconnect couplings and self-mating connectors which allow rapid assembly and/or disassembly for reconfiguration, transport, or servicing. The manipulator is a completely enclosed assembly, with no exposed components or wires. Although the initial prototype will not be space qualified, the design is well suited to meeting space requirements. The control system provides dexterous motion by controlling the endpoint location and arm pose simultaneously. Potential applications are discussed

Robotics for nuclear power plants - Challenges and future perspectives

Use of robotics and computerized tools in Nuclear Power Plants (NPPs) has been identified as a highly recommended practice by IAEA. The key rationale of robotics application has always been to avoid human exposure to hazardous environments and tasks ranging from scrutiny and general maintenance to decontamination and post accidental activities. To execute these activities, robots need to incorporate artificial intelligence, improved sensors capability, enhanced data fusion and compliant human like leg and hand structures for efficient motions. Next generation robotic systems in NPPs are expected to work in full autonomous mode in contrast to the current semi-autonomous scenarios. Far future systems could deploy humanoid robots as well. This paper presents state-of-theart of robotics developed for NPPs, associated challenges and finally comments on future directions

A Multiagent System for Intelligent Material Handling

The goal of our research is to investigate manipulation, mobility, sensing, control and coordination for a multiagent robotic system employed in the task of material handling, in an unstructured, indoor environment. In this research, manipulators, observers, vehicles, sensors, and human operator(s) are considered to be agents. Alternatively, an agent can be a general-purpose agent (for example, a six degree of freedom manipulator on a mobile platform with visual force, touch and position sensors). Possible applications for such a system includes handling of waste and hazardous materials, decontamination of nuclear plants, and interfacing between special purpose material handling devices in warehouses. The fundamental research problems that will be studied are organization, or the decomposition of the task into subtasks and configuring the multiple agents with appropriate human interaction, exploration, or the process of exploring geometric, material and other properties about the environment and other agents, and coordination, or the dynamic control of multiple agents for manipulation and transportation of objects to a desired destination