Spaceward Bound Expedition

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The next generation of robot explorers will have a more difficult task to complete and that is finding life on planets like Mars. Life has found many different ways to survive in some of the most extreme environments. Now scientists are trying to develop robots that can get to unique locations such as lava tubes, caves, or deep in a planets crust to test for life. Other scientists are trying to come up with ways to detect the life once we get to those locations.

Over the next week, a team of scientists, teachers and students will be in the Mojave desert doing just that. They will be working as part of the Spaceward Bound Expedition. On this expedition, they will be trying to remotely detect lava tubes, fissures, and caves and doing experiments with the soil to determine the best ways to find life. These teams will use their results to design better experiments and robots. The teachers will also use this experience to get their students involved in exploration.

As I get the chance, I will post updates on our work. You can also find more information at the Spaceward Bound website. There will be a live webcast from the expedition on Wed. the 28th. The link to the webcast will be on the Spaceward Bound website.

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The days in the Mojave were long but terrific. I had a great time and learned a lot. I am attaching a link to my blog since we did too much each day to post here. Other blogs can be found at the Spaceward Bound site.

http://mojaversscience.blogspot.com/

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For those of you interested in the thermal imaging of caves, here is a link to one of the teachers involved in that project.

http://quest.nasa.gov/projects/spacewardbound/mojave2007/journals/hooverjournals&pics.pdf

[Kevin Berry]

Hey -

On the last line of the blog page, you mention using robots to explore the caves. Got any details?

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Thanks for asking. I have been wanting to finish the blog about the expedition, but something else always seems to come up. Carnegie Mellon designed the robot used on the expedition. It was constructed from mainly off-the-shelf parts. Many of the chassis components and wheels were RC truck parts, as well as the batteries and I think the motors. One of the ideas we discussed, was the use of robot assistants for expeditions to the Moon and Mars. These assistants could dig holes and take soil samples and do routine tests that would allow the astronaut to avoid the dangers of being outside too much. One of the tasks a robot could do, would be to explore lava tubes for habitation sites, or for life. One of the experiments that we wanted to try, was to see how well a portable wireless system would work. It would be hard to communicate with the robot underground in a lava tube, so to improve communications a wireless hub would be placed at the entrance to the tube The portable wireless system we used worked well in tests, but the day it was tried at the lava tube the batteries failed. Another rover was used, but it was more of a VEX type system with RC control instead of the wireless system. I’ll try to post some photos of both of the rovers.

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At the bottom of this post are some pdf journal entries from the expedition with pictures of the rovers.

This link

http://quest.nasa.gov/projects/spacewardbound/mojave2007/journals.html

will take you to the journal and picture page from the expedition .