German Aerospace Center's advanced robotic technology for future lunar scientific missions

Philosophical Transactions. Series A, Mathematical, Physical, and Engineering Sciences
Armin WedlerJosef Reill

Abstract

The Earth's moon is currently an object of interest of many space agencies for unmanned robotic missions within this decade. Besides future prospects for building lunar gateways as support to human space flight, the Moon is an attractive location for scientific purposes. Not only will its study give insight on the foundations of the Solar System but also its location, uncontaminated by the Earth's ionosphere, represents a vantage point for the observation of the Sun and planetary bodies outside the Solar System. Lunar exploration has been traditionally conducted by means of single-agent robotic assets, which is a limiting factor for the return of scientific missions. The German Aerospace Center (DLR) is developing fundamental technologies towards increased autonomy of robotic explorers to fulfil more complex mission tasks through cooperation. This paper presents an overview of past, present and future activities of DLR towards highly autonomous systems for scientific missions targeting the Moon and other planetary bodies. The heritage from the Mobile Asteroid Scout (MASCOT), developed jointly by DLR and CNES and deployed on asteroid Ryugu on 3 October 2018 from JAXA's Hayabusa2 spacecraft, inspired the development of novel core...Continue Reading

References

Jun 3, 2006·Science·Hajime YanoM Yoshikawa

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Citations

Nov 24, 2020·Philosophical Transactions. Series A, Mathematical, Physical, and Engineering Sciences·Joseph SilkJohn Zarnecki

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Software Mentioned

Apollo
CNSA
JAXA
MMX
ESA
MASCOT
ROSCOSMOS
Radio
ARCHES
- CPT

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