Cave exploration robot contest

[nancylebov]

https://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/robotics-hardware/darpa-subt-team-csiro-data-61?fbclid=IwAR2mkZpV3Qbs3b0gJhae5aX6BWtA3MGY7yIAhaOpG9hHls3O4oLC42crLbk#.X8m

This is incredibly cool-- an Australian team has a combined robot on tracks and drone team for cave exploration.

Sometimes it's more competent on its own, sometimes the human operators do better. It's not just that it can cover terrain (like steep slippery slopes) that people can't, its navigation skills are sometimes excellent.

While this is an effort to design robots for exploring caves on the moon and Mars, there are caves on earth that can't be fully explored by humans, and I expect this system or another robot system will be used here.

Comments

[madfilkentist]

Drones wouldn't work on the Moon, and probably not on Mars.

[warriorsavant]

Drones don't have to fly (although I think I read they did have a drone fly a short distance in the Martian atmosphere). Or if you prefer, can substitute "autonomic vehicle" for drone.

[warriorsavant]

Way cool.
Also, it does seem like human-robotic teams act synergistically in many cases. Cyborg anyone? (I don't think wearing glasses counts.)