Related papers: LunarNav: Crater-based Localization for Long-range…
Future Moon bases will likely be constructed using resources mined from the surface of the Moon. The difficulty of maintaining a human workforce on the Moon and communications lag with Earth means that mining will need to be conducted using…
Experiments, analyses, and simulations have shown that the engine exhaust plume of a Mars lander large enough for human spaceflight will create a deep crater in the martian soil, blowing ejecta to approximately 1 km distance, damaging the…
We present a method for image-guided exploration for mobile robotic systems. Our approach extends ergodic exploration methods, a recent exploration approach that prioritizes complete coverage of a space, with the use of a learned image…
TeamIndus' lunar logistics vision includes multiple lunar missions to meet requirements of science, commercial and efforts towards global exploration. The first mission is slated for launch in 2020. The prime objective is to demonstrate…
Private lunar missions are faced with the challenge of robust autonomous navigation while operating under stringent constraints on mass, power, and computational resources. This work proposes a motion-field inversion framework that uses…
Craters are one of the most prominent features on planetary surfaces, used in applications such as age estimation, hazard detection, and spacecraft navigation. Crater detection is a challenging problem due to various aspects, including…
As natural access points to the subsurface, lava tubes and other caves have become premier targets of planetary missions for astrobiological analyses. Few existing robotic paradigms, however, are able to explore such challenging…
The Asteroid Redirect Mission (ARM) proposes to retrieve a near-Earth asteroid and position it in a lunar distant retrograde orbit (DRO) for later study, crewed exploration, and ultimately resource exploitation. During the Caltech Space…
Due to the highly complex environment present during the DARPA Subterranean Challenge, all six funded teams relied on legged robots as part of their robotic team. Their unique locomotion skills of being able to step over obstacles require…
Current practice for asteroid close proximity maneuvers requires extremely accurate characterization of the environmental dynamics and precise spacecraft positioning prior to the maneuver. This creates a delay of several months between the…
PODIUM is a compact spacecraft navigation unit, currently being designed to provide interplanetary missions with autonomous position and velocity estimations. The unit will make use of Pulsar X-ray observations to measure the distance and…
Detailed surface images of the Moon and Mars reveal hundreds of cave-like openings. These cave-like openings are theorized to be remnants of lava-tubes and their interior maybe in pristine conditions. These locations may have well preserved…
Slip detection is of fundamental importance for the safety and efficiency of rovers driving on the surface of extraterrestrial bodies. Current planetary rover slip detection systems rely on visual perception on the assumption that…
Autonomous vehicles require precise knowledge of their position and orientation in all weather and traffic conditions for path planning, perception, control, and general safe operation. Here we derive these requirements for autonomous…
Robots often use feature-based image tracking to identify their position in their surrounding environment; however, feature-based image tracking is prone to errors in low-textured and poorly lit environments. Specifically, we investigate a…
The radio environment of the Moon at low frequencies, particularly in lunar polar regions and the permanently shadowed regions (PSR) found there, is relatively poorly explored and may contain some novel features. In addition, these areas of…
The surge of deep-space probes makes it unsustainable to navigate them with standard radiometric tracking. Self-driving interplanetary satellites represent a solution to this problem. In this work, a full vision-based navigation algorithm…
Space exploration has witnessed revolutionary changes upon landing of the Perseverance Rover on the Martian surface and demonstrating the first flight beyond Earth by the Mars helicopter, Ingenuity. During their mission on Mars,…
Autonomous exploration of subterranean environments constitutes a major frontier for robotic systems as underground settings present key challenges that can render robot autonomy hard to achieve. This has motivated the DARPA Subterranean…
The 2009 Lunar CRater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS) impact mission detected water ice absorption using spectroscopic observations of the impact-generated debris plume taken by the Shepherding Spacecraft, confirming an existing…