Related papers: Path Planning and Navigation Inside Off-World Lava…
We propose a robotic learning system for autonomous exploration and navigation in unexplored environments. We are motivated by the idea that even an unseen environment may be familiar from previous experiences in similar environments. The…
Autonomous robots navigating in off-road terrain like forests open new opportunities for automation. While off-road navigation has been studied, existing work often relies on clearly delineated pathways. We present a method allowing for…
Permanently Shadowed Regions (PSRs) near the lunar poles are of interest for future exploration due to their potential to contain water ice and preserve geological records. Their complex, uneven terrain favors the use of legged robots,…
SPHEREx is a NASA infrared astronomy mission that launched on March 12th, 2025 and is operating successfully in low-Earth orbit (LEO). The mission is currently observing the entire sky in 102 spectral channels in four independent all-sky…
NASA aims to establish a sustainable human basecamp on the Moon as a stepping stone for future missions to Mars and beyond. The discovery of water ice on the Moon's craters located in permanently shadowed regions, which can provide drinking…
This paper focuses on online occupancy mapping and real-time collision checking onboard an autonomous robot navigating in a large unknown environment. Commonly used voxel and octree map representations can be easily maintained in a small…
Simultaneous Localization and Mapping (SLAM) in large-scale, unknown, and complex subterranean environments is a challenging problem. Sensors must operate in off-nominal conditions; uneven and slippery terrains make wheel odometry…
Exploration of unknown, unstructured environments, such as in search and rescue, cave exploration, and planetary missions,presents significant challenges due to their unpredictable nature. This unpredictability can lead to inefficient path…
Robots are increasingly operating in indoor environments designed for and shared with people. However, robots working safely and autonomously in uneven and unstructured environments still face great challenges. Many modern indoor…
Autonomous navigation of a mobile robot is a challenging task which requires ability of mapping, localization, path planning and path following. Conventional mapping methods build a dense metric map like an occupancy grid, which is affected…
Autonomous surface vessels (ASV) represent a promising technology to automate water-quality monitoring of lakes. In this work, we use satellite images as a coarse map and plan sampling routes for the robot. However, inconsistency between…
In a typical path planning pipeline for a ground robot, we build a map (e.g., an occupancy grid) of the environment as the robot moves around. While navigating indoors, a ground robot's knowledge about the environment may be limited due to…
This paper presents a novel 3D myopic coverage path planning algorithm for lunar micro-rovers that can explore unknown environments with limited sensing and computational capabilities. The algorithm expands upon traditional non-graph path…
Lunar exploration has become a key focus, driving scientific and technological advances. Ongoing missions are deploying rovers to the surface of the Moon, targeting the far side and south pole. However, these terrains pose challenges,…
This paper presents a novel approach for autonomous cooperating UAVs in search and rescue operations in subterranean domains with complex topology. The proposed system was ranked second in the Virtual Track of the DARPA SubT Finals as part…
This paper introduces a new method for robot motion planning and navigation in uneven environments through a surfel representation of underlying point clouds. The proposed method addresses the shortcomings of state-of-the-art navigation…
Robotic exploration of underground environments is a particularly challenging problem due to communication, endurance, and traversability constraints which necessitate high degrees of autonomy and agility. These challenges are further…
Visual robot navigation within large-scale, semi-structured environments deals with various challenges such as computation intensive path planning algorithms or insufficient knowledge about traversable spaces. Moreover, many…
The exploration of planetary surfaces is predominately unmanned, calling for a landing vehicle and an autonomous and/or teleoperated rover. Artificial intelligence and machine learning techniques can be leveraged for better mission…
Exploring an unknown environment without colliding with obstacles is one of the essentials of autonomous vehicles to perform diverse missions such as structural inspections, rescues, deliveries, and so forth. Therefore, unmanned aerial…