Researchers may send a robotic "snake" to Mars attached to a rover explorer.
The extended "arms' could aid in collecting soil samples, the little robot could detach from the rover's main body and fit into tight spaces that could not have been explored before, a SINTEF press release reported.
"Maneuverability is a challenge. The Spirit rover was lost after it became stuck in the sand on Mars. The vehicles just cannot get to many of the places from which samples have to be taken", researchers Pål Liljebäck and Aksel Transeth said at SINTEF ICT.
The researchers hope to figure out a way for "rover and robot to work together." One idea is to attach the snake-like arm to the rover with a power cable, which would keep the robot from dying or getting lost. The pair could also communicate through the cableby sending signals back and forth along the wire.
"The connection between the robot and the rover also means that the snake robot will be able to assist the vehicle if the latter gets stuck," Liljebäck. "In such a situation, the robot could lower itself to the ground and coil itself around a rock enabling the rover pull itself loose by means of the cable winch, which the rover would normally use to pull the snake robot towards the rover."
Another idea is the robot could sit on top of the robot or be stored below, but this would require a "hoisting mechanism" to detach and reattach the mechanical snake.
At the Department of Applied Cybernetics, we have been working closely with the Norwegian University of Science and Technology's (NTNU's) Department of Engineering Cybernetics on snake robots for many years, and our teams have had some ideas about this for a long time," Transeth and Liljebäck said.
"It is only now that we are starting to see some actual applications, and it is wonderful to be given this opportunity to provide the ESA with information about future technologies in this field. What we hope is that our ideas will trigger the ESA into initiating a targeted development process around this kind of system," they said.
WATCH:
