Instead of rolling, Hedgehog hops and tumbles. These have very little gravity and extremely rough terrain. Hedgehog is designed to explore small bodies, such as asteroids or comets. This spiky cube of a robot is being developed by NASA with Stanford University and MIT. Image credit: NASA/JPL-CaltechĬertainly not! Take a look at this robot, called Hedgehog. The BRUIE robot rolls its wheels on the underside of an icy surface. For example, the underground oceans of Jupiter’s moon Europa or Saturn’s moon Enceladus. Scientists hope to someday use a robot like this to search for signs of life on icy bodies elsewhere in the solar system. This robot can float in the water and roll its wheels along the underside of an icy surface, all while taking pictures and collecting data. Then there’s BRUIE, the Buoyant Rover for Under-Ice Exploration. Watch this video to see Puffer in action! Video credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech The robot can flatten itself out and duck down to investigate tight spots.
The inspiration for this lightweight, two-wheeled adventurer came from origami designs. One of the latest robots is nicknamed A-PUFFER, short for Autonomous Pop-Up Flat Folding Explorer Robot. NASA has been investigating Mars with rovers since the Pathfinder mission landed in 1997 and deployed a small rover called Sojourner. NASA engineers are working on new robots all the time. But those are just a few of the most famous robots. You’ve probably heard of some of NASA’s robots: the Mars rovers, like Perseverance and Curiosity. What are some of the robots NASA is currently developing? Robots can also be built to do things that would be too risky or impossible for astronauts. Some can withstand harsh conditions, like extreme temperatures or high levels of radiation. Plus, robots can do lots of things that humans can’t. They can survive in space for many years and can be left out there-no need for a return trip! Robots don’t need to eat or sleep or go to the bathroom. Sending a robot to space is also much cheaper than sending a human. But even if a robotic mission fails, the humans involved with the mission stay safe. We need them to stick around long enough to investigate and send us information about their destinations. Of course, we want these carefully built robots to last. We can send robots to explore space without having to worry so much about their safety. The Curiosity rover takes a self-portrait on a Martian sand dune.
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