Related papers: Enabling Astronaut Self-Scheduling using a Robust …

As humanity pivots toward long-duration interplanetary travel, the psychological constraints of Isolated and Confined Environments (ICE) emerge as a primary mission risk. This paper presents COSMIC (COmpanion System for Mission Interaction…

As the dependence on satellite imaging continues to grow, modern satellites have become increasingly agile, with the new generation, namely super-agile Earth observation satellites (SAEOS), providing unprecedented imaging flexibility. The…

While the capabilities of autonomous systems have been steadily improving in recent years, these systems still struggle to rapidly explore previously unknown environments without the aid of GPS-assisted navigation. The DARPA Subterranean…

Nowadays, realistic simulation environments are essential to validate and build reliable robotic solutions. This is particularly true when using Reinforcement Learning (RL) based control policies. To this end, both robotics and RL…

The Time-Domain And MultiMessenger (TDAMM) Communications Science Analysis Group (TDAMMCommSAG) was formulated to describe the unique technical challenges of communicating rapidly to and from NASA astrophysics missions studying the most…

The Curiosity rover is one of the most complex systems successfully deployed in a planetary exploration mission to date. It was sent by NASA to explore the surface of Mars and to identify potential signs of life. Even though it has limited…

Large language models (LLMs) are increasingly deployed as the execution core of autonomous agents rather than as standalone text generators. Agentic workloads induce a temporal shift from single-turn inference to multi-turn LLM-tool loops,…

Autonomous agents are limited in their ability to observe the world state. Partially observable Markov decision processes (POMDPs) formally model the problem of planning under world state uncertainty, but POMDPs with continuous actions and…

The European Space Agency (ESA) has a clear mission to go forward to the Moon in preparation of human presence on Mars. One of the technologies looked at to increase safety and efficiency of astronauts in this context is Augmented Reality…

The miniaturization of electronics, sensors and actuators has enabled the growing use of CubeSats and sub-20 kg spacecraft. Their reduced mass and volume has the potential to translate into significant reductions in required propellant and…

Simultaneous localization and Planning (SLAP) is a crucial ability for an autonomous robot operating under uncertainty. In its most general form, SLAP induces a continuous POMDP (partially-observable Markov decision process), which needs to…

This paper studies the measurement scheduling problem for a group of N mobile robots moving on a flat surface that are preforming cooperative localization (CL). We consider a scenario in which due to the limited on-board resources such as…

Deep space missions face extreme communication delays and environmental uncertainty that prevent real-time ground operations. To support autonomous science operations in communication-constrained environments, we present a partially…

Space exploration and establishing human presence on other planets demand advanced technology and effective collaboration between robots and astronauts. Efficient space resource utilization is also vital for extraterrestrial settlements.…

Efficient robotic extraterrestrial exploration requires robots with diverse capabilities, ranging from scientific measurement tools to advanced locomotion. A robotic team enables the distribution of tasks over multiple specialized…

This paper describes a technique for the autonomous mission planning of robotic swarms in high risk environments where agent disablement is likely. Given a swarm operating in a known area, a central command system generates measurements…

Robot-aided exploration of planetary surfaces is essential for understanding geologic processes, yet many scientifically valuable regions, such as Martian dunes and lunar craters, remain hazardous due to loose, deformable regolith. We…

Large language models (LLMs) demonstrate strong potential as agents for tool invocation due to their advanced comprehension and planning capabilities. Users increasingly rely on LLM-based agents to solve complex missions through iterative…

This work presents the computational design and validation of the Multi-Arm Relocatable Manipulator (MARM), a three-limb robot for space applications, with particular reference to the MIRROR (i.e., the Multi-arm Installation Robot for…

The next frontier in solar system exploration will be missions targeting extreme and rugged environments such as caves, canyons, cliffs and crater rims of the Moon, Mars and icy moons. These environments are time capsules into early…