Humans will journey to Mars in the 2030s accompanied by robots, if Nasa’s ambitious plans become reality.
The US space agency has launched a $1 million competition challenging engineers to develop the capabilities of humanoid robots, which will help astronauts on their long and arduous journey to the red planet.
The Space Robotics Challenge will see teams program a virtual robot modelled on Nasa’s advanced Robonaut R5 android, dubbed Valkyrie, to complete a series of virtual tasks that could save human crew members’ lives, such as repairing leaks.
Valkyrie is a six foot tall, 290 pound humanoid designed to work in extreme environments. It can ‘see’ thanks to sensors and cameras in its head, walk, and grasp objects in its hands, which have three fingers and a thumb.
The greatest challenge will be increasing the robot’s dexterity so it can perform delicate operations with its hands.
While highly dexterous robots using hydraulics have been developed and work well on Earth, such robots cannot be used on Mars because of its sub-zero temperatures, which can dip as low as -176°C.
To overcome this problem, the R5 uses elastics technology instead of hydraulics – an innovative way of addressing the problems of operating in space.
To win the competition, teams will have to resolve the aftermath of a dust storm that has damaged a Martian habitat, in a virtual simulation.
They must meet three objectives; aligning a communications dish, repairing a solar array, and fixing a habitat leak, all of which would pose serious danger to astronauts if the scenarios were to occur for real on Mars.
Teams will also have to deal with periods of latency to represent the communications delay from Earth to Mars, making the tasks even trickier.
“Precise and dexterous robotics, able to work with a communications delay, could be used in spaceflight and ground missions to Mars and elsewhere for hazardous and complicated tasks, which will be crucial to support our astronauts,” said Monsi Roman, program manager of Nasa’s Centennial Challenges.
“Nasa and our partners are confident the public will rise to this challenge, and are excited to see what innovative technologies will be produced.”
Teams can sign up for the challenge from today, with a qualifying round running from mid-September to mid-November.
Finalists of that round will be announced in December and will engage in open practice from January to early June 2017.
The final virtual competition will be held in June 2017, after which the winners will be announced at Nasa’s space centre in Houston, Texas. It’s hoped British universities will enter the competition.
Earlier this year the University of Edinburgh took delivery of Nasa’s Valkyrie humanoid, which is part of the Robotarium, at the heart of its Centre for Robotics.
The software developed as a result of the challenge could also be used in other robots to boost the functionality of older Robonauts, one of which is working aboard the International Space Station.
With the technology generated by this challenge, robots could participate in precursor missions to selected landing sites, arriving long before astronauts to set up habitats, life support systems, communications and solar apparatuses, and even begin preliminary scientific research, Nasa said.
The space agency’s ambitious plans for a manned mission Mars were first outlined in 2010.
Communications systems and other technologies needed for a such a mission are being tested on the International Space Station in preparation for when Nasa will send a robotic mission to capture and redirect an asteroid to orbit the moon.
Astronauts aboard the Orion spacecraft will explore the asteroid in the 2020s, returning to Earth with samples.
The idea is that this experience in human spaceflight beyond low-Earth orbit will help Nasa test new systems and capabilities, such as Solar Electric Propulsion, which will be needed to send cargo as part of human missions to Mars.
Human missions to Mars, planned for the 2030s, will rely on Orion and an evolved version of Nasa’s powerful Space Launch System (SLS) rocket which is currently being developed.
Astronauts would make the 40 million mile journey, predicted to take approximately 100 days, to orbit the red planet.
Subsequent missions could see them setting up camp on Mars, although this will pose a different challenge, because Mars’ gravity is 63 per cent weaker than on Earth and the average temperature is 62°C.
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
