Robot Tracking of Human Subjects in Field Environments

Future planetary exploration will involve both humans and robots. Understanding and improving their interaction is a main focus of research in the Intelligent Systems Branch at NASA's Johnson Space Center. By teaming intelligent robots with astronauts on surface extra-vehicular activities (EVAs), safety and productivity can be improved. The EVA Robotic Assistant (ERA) project was established to study the issues of human-robot teams, to develop a testbed robot to assist space-suited humans in exploration tasks, and to experimentally determine the effectiveness of an EVA assistant robot. A companion paper discusses the ERA project in general, its history starting with ASRO (Astronaut-Rover project), and the results of recent field tests in Arizona. This paper focuses on one aspect of the research, robot tracking, in greater detail: the software architecture and algorithms. The ERA robot is capable of moving towards and/or continuously following mobile or stationary targets or sequences of targets. The contributions made by this research include how the low-level pose data is assembled, normalized and communicated, how the tracking algorithm was generalized and implemented, and qualitative performance reports from recent field tests

Solar Based Navigation For Robotic Explorers

This thesis introduces the application of solar position and shadowing information to robotic exploration. Power is a critical resource for robots with remote, long-term missions, so this research focuses on the power generation capabilities of robotic explorers during navigational tasks, in addition to power consumption. Solar power is primarily considered, with the possibility of wind power also contemplated. Information about the environment, including the solar ephemeris, terrain features, time of day, and surface location, is incorporated into a planning structure, allowing robots to accurately predict shadowing and thus potential costs and gains during navigational tasks. By evaluating its potential to generate and expend power, a robot can extend its lifetime and accomplishments. The primary tasks studied are coverage patterns, with a variety of plans developed for this research. The use of sun, terrain and temporal information also enables new capabilities of identifying and fo..

Deans, Moorehead, Shamah, Shillcutt, Whittaker

The lunar south pole region may contain frozen volatiles such as water and carbon dioxide in surface depressions which are permanently dark. The low Sun angles of the region create these permanently dark areas and also provide nearby regions of long term sunlight and moderate temperatures which benefit robotic exploration. In this paper a concept for a robotic explorer named Icebreaker is presented. It is designed to take advantage of the south pole environment and to find and analyze frozen volatiles. Icebreaker is an innovative new spacecraft concept which combines the functionality of traditional landing craft and mobile robots into one integrated vehicle. This type of vehicle will allow larger science packages to be delivered to the planets. Icebreaker will acquire samples with a drill and determine the presence and composition of volatiles inside cold traps using a Regolith Evolved Gas Analyzer (REGA). 1. Introduction The south pole region of the Moon provides a unique environment..