Towards a Semi-Autonomous Robotic Exploration of a Lunar Skylight Cavity
Roland Sonsalla, Steffen Planthaber, Raúl Domínguez, Alexander Dettmann, Florian Cordes, Benjamin Hülsen, Christopher Schulz, Patrick Schöberl, Sebastian Kasperski, Henning Wiedemann, Frank Kirchner
In Proceedings of the IEEE Aerospace Conference, 5.3.-12.3.2022, Big Sky, Montana, IEEE, Mar/2022. IEEE.
Zusammenfassung (Abstract)
:
This study evaluates the feasibility of a robotic exploration
mission to a skylight located in the Marius Hills region
on Moon. The study is based on theoretical evaluations while
making use of existing results from previous and currently
running projects. Parts of the approach were already evaluated
by autonomously navigating and mapping in a lava tube and
other field trials in analogue environments.We address a solution
to access and map a lunar lava tube with a semi-autonomous
heterogenous team of exploration rovers. Main systems are: 1)
a surface rover, which serves as anchoring point, communication
relay and power generator, 2) a highly mobile exploration
micro rover foreseen to rappel down into the skylight for tube
exploration and 3) a tether management and docking system
which can be attached to the exploration rover to safely lower
it into the lava tube and serve as power and communication
hub during cave exploration. For descending we propose a rappelling
approach using tethering and actively controlled hybrid
legged-wheels on the exploration rover. The rover uses path
planning to avoid obstacles on its way down the vertical surface.
When the bottom of the skylight is reached, the tether spool
is deployed as docking station. After successful deployment,
different autonomy levels are possible -from remote-controlled
to fully autonomous- to explore the unknown environment.