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Posted by on July 20, 2007, 5:09 pm
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July 20, 2007
Beth Dickey/Melissa Mathews
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-2087/1272
beth.dickey-1@nasa.gov, melissa.mathews-1@nasa.gov
John Bluck
Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif.
650-604-5026/9000
john.g.bluck@nasa.gov
RELEASE: 07-163
NASA ROBOTS PRACTICE MOON SURVEY IN THE ARCTIC CIRCLE
MOFFETT FIELD, Calif. -- Two NASA robots are surveying a rocky,
isolated polar desert within a crater in the Arctic Circle. The study
will help scientists learn how robots could evaluate potential
outposts on the moon or Mars.
The robots, K10 Black and K10 Red, carry 3-D laser scanners and
ground-penetrating radar. The team arrived at Haughton Crater at
Devon Island, Canada, on July 12 and will operate the machines until
July 31. Scientists chose the polar region because of the extreme
environmental conditions, lack of infrastructure and resources, and
geologic features. Additionally, Haughton Crater is geographically
similar to Shackleton Crater at the South Pole of the moon. Both are
impact craters that measure roughly 12.4 miles in diameter.
"We are learning about the awesome potential of human and robot
teams," said S. Pete Worden, director of NASA's Ames Research Center
in Moffett Field, Calif., where the group conducting the survey is
based. "Studying how humans and robots can maximize scientific
returns in sites such as Devon Island will prepare us to walk on the
moon and Mars."
NASA is planning to send astronauts back to the moon by 2020. Prior
to
establishing a lunar outpost, the agency must conduct detailed
surveys at a variety of locations to produce maps, look for minerals
and water, and learn other details. NASA plans to accomplish its
surveys with an automated orbiting spacecraft, not a robotic lander,
but the agency still has a keen interest in advancing the laser
scanning technology.
Most of the lunar sites are on harsh terrain and in permanently
shadowed areas. It is not unusual for site surveys to require
thousands of measurements and hundreds of hours to complete. A robot
can reduce mission cost and improve mission effectiveness by allowing
ground control to conduct surveying tasks.
"A typical scenario involves multiple rovers autonomously surveying a
region while humans supervise and assess data from a remote
location," said Terry Fong, director of the Intelligent Robots Group
at Ames.
The robots are using different techniques than the goal-directed
traverses and isolated sampling tasks that Mars scientific rovers
have used to explore the Red Planet. K10 Black and K10 Red are using
a mix of information previously obtained by aerial and satellite
imaging and data that the robot survey team is gathering.
The 3-D laser scanner can map topographic features as far as 3,280
feet away. The ground-penetrating radar, which NASA's Jet Propulsion
Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., developed, can map below ground as
deep as 16.4 feet.
"The robots are covering the area in lawnmower-like paths at human
walking speeds to systematically map above and below ground," said
Fong.
The practice survey in Haughton Crater is taking place at an area
called Drill Hill. The robots are covering approximately 120 acres of
terrain. Researchers are commanding the robots remotely from the
Haughton-Mars base camp more than two miles away from Drill Hill.
The robots navigate using the Global Positioning System, stereo
cameras, laser scanners and sun trackers. Each of the
four-wheel-drive machines weighs 165 pounds and can carry a payload
up to 110 pounds.
A key objective of the Drill Hill survey is to test the instruments
and software on the robots as well as the equipment and software that
humans will use at lunar outposts and ground control to supervise the
robots. Engineers at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston will
assess advanced robot driving techniques using a multi-screen
cockpit. Ames will test software that makes high-resolution maps for
interactive display in 3-D.
NASA's Exploration Technology Development Program sponsors the
robotic
site survey at Haughton Crater.
For more information, including an updated blog, visit:
http://haughton2007.arc.nasa.gov
-end-
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Posted by on August 14, 2007, 2:10 am
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Bouquets of the
: prohibited poppies can sometimes be found in supermarkets.
:
: Mr. Hogshire was arrested for possession of dried poppy pods which can be
: bought in most any florist's shop or craft store.
:
: The charges have finally been dropped.
:
: Prosecution is so rare his story made the cover of Harper's magazine.
:
: One police officer told him:
:
: "With what you write, weren't you expecting this?"
* "Project L.U.C.I.D.", by Texe Marrs, 1996, ISBN 1-884302-02-5
*
* Individuals who have been arrested and their property seized will then be
* transported with other dissidents to a Federal Prison Transfer Center for
* proper "categorization" and "disposition."
*
* Entire families are to be disposed of in this manner. Final disposition,
* when deemed appropriate, will be made at a regional Processing and
* Detention Center. Other countries have called these 'concentration camps'
* and 'gulags'.
*
* At these "Centers," methods and techniques of interrogation, torture and
* final disposition honed and developed by the CIA and Special Forces Green
* Berets through their 'Operation Phoenix' program are to be used on
* victimized citizens.
*
* Operation Phoenix, during the Vietnam conflict, was responsible for the
* arrest, incarceration, torture and murder of over 50,000 innocent civilians.
*
* The CIA and U.S. Army acclaimed it a success and a model for future "human
* pacification" programs.
* http://ursula.blythe.org/NameBase
*
* Valentine, Douglas. The Phoenix Program. New York: William Morrow, 1990.
* 479 pages.
*
* Operation Phoenix
*
* Along with saturation bombing of civilian populations, Operation Phoenix
* has to rate as America's most atrocious chapter in the V
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