Category Archives: Education

Contests and Games, Education, Science and Technology

NASA Sample Return Robot Challenge competition update

None of the robots fielded by 11 teams in NASA’s Sample Return Robot Challenge completed the requirements to win the $1.5M competition in this years event, which was held at Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) June 5-7 in Worcester, Massachusetts. The goal is to “demonstrate a robot that can locate and collect samples from a wide and varied terrain, operating without human control.”

There was, however, considerable improvement in overall performance as compared to the event last and one team did complete the first phase and received a $5k prize for that accomplishment.

WPI is managing the contest, which has been held twice so far. There will be presumably be another competition event next year. Here are two WPI sites related to the challenge:

Here’s a local article about the competition:  Party at WPI – Worcester Telegram & Gazette – telegram.com.

And here is an official press release from NASA:

NASA Awards Sample Return Robot Centennial Challenge Prize

After two days of extensive competition, Team Survey of Los Angeles was awarded $5,000 in prize money after successfully completing Level 1 of the Sample Return Robot Challenge, a part of NASA’s Centennial Challenges prize program.

The event, hosted by Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) June 5-7 in Worcester, Mass., drew robotics teams from the United States, Canada and Estonia to compete for a total of $1.5 million in NASA prize money. Eleven teams arrived to compete at WPI; 10 teams passed the initial inspection and took to the challenge field. After two rounds of Level 1 competition, Team Survey met the $5,000 prize requirements and was declared the winner of this year’s competition.

Sample Return Robot Challenge (201306050010HQ)
A NASA 2013 Sample Return Robot Challenge staff member raises a pause
flag as the AERO (Autonomous Exploration RObot) robot attempts level one of the
challenge at Institute Park, Wednesday, June 5, 2013, Worcester Polytechnic
Institute (WPI) in Worcester, Mass.

Team Survey members Jascha Little, Russel Howe, Zac Lizer, Tommy Smith, Zoe Stephenson, Scott Little, Brandon Booth, and Joanna Balme, all from Los Angeles, were presented a check June 8 by NASA’s Larry Cooper, Centennial Challenges program executive, at the opening of the TouchTomorrow technology festival. A WPI organized science and robotics festival attracted thousands of attendees, showcasing the teams and robots as well as NASA and WPI exhibits in science, robotics and space technology.

“It is evident from the level of improvements the teams have shown from last year’s event to this week’s Level 1 win that the technology has significantly progressed, and the desired results of this challenge are within reach,” said Sam Ortega, program manager of Centennial Challenges. “We are so proud of the great spirit and camaraderie the teams have shown, as well. It speaks volumes about the caliber of teams and individuals who compete in these events.”

NASA uses prize competitions to increase the number and diversity of the individuals, organizations and teams that are addressing a particular problem or challenge. Prize competitions stimulate private sector investment that is many times greater than the cash value of the prize and further NASA’s mission by attracting interest and attention to a defined technical objective.

To win prize dollars, teams were required to demonstrate a robot that can locate and collect samples from a wide and varied terrain, operating without human control. The objective of the challenge was to encourage innovations in autonomous navigation and robotics technologies.

Team Survey’s robot successfully completed Level 1 by navigating from the starting platform and locating a sample that was previously identified in the robot’s onboard computer. The robot then autonomously returned one undamaged sample to its starting platform within the 30-minute time limit. No teams made it to the second level of the competition this year.

Returning teams this year included SpacePRIDE of Graniteville, S.C.; Survey of Los Angeles; Wunderkammer of Topanga, Calif.; Intrepid of Lynnwood, Wash.; and the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada. New teams entering the competition this year were Fetch of Alexandria, Va.; Middleman of Dunedin, Fla.; Mystic Lake Robots of The Woodlands, Texas; Team AERO of Worcester, Mass.; the Autonomous Rover Team of the University of California at Santa Cruz; and Kuukuglur of Estonia.

NASA’s Centennial Challenges program is part of the agency’s Space Technology Mission Directorate, which is innovating, developing, testing and flying hardware for use in NASA’s future missions. For more information about the Space Technology Mission Directorate and the Centennial Challenges Program, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/spacetech

Education, SETI

Video: Final presentations in SETI Institute/San Jose State Univ. astrobiology undergrad program

This video shows the final student  presentation for the SETI Institute’s URSA (Undergraduate Research at the SETI Institute  in Astrobiology)  program with San Jose State University . See also Undergraduate Research at the SETI Institute in Astrobiology (USRA): a Partnership Between the SETI Institute and San Jose State University-SETI Institute

Education, Space Arts

Student collaborative art project wants to wrap a Saturn V in quilts

Robert Pearlman writes about a collaborative art project that intends to wrap a Saturn V rocket in quilts: Saturn V Switch: Art Project Picks Real Moon Rocket Over Replica for Quilt Covering -Space.com.

Find more about the project at its Kickstarter: Wrapping the REAL Saturn V Moon Rocket by International Fiber Collaborative, Inc. — Kickstarter

For some students this is their first introduction to space, science and art.

Wrapping the indoor real Saturn V Moon Rocket would have profound impact beyond our original intent to wrap the vertical Saturn V replica, we would like to pursue this option.

It would be awesome to walk under the entire  length of the indoor rocket and look up to see all the art. We would have a hard time seeing all of the art on the outdoor vertical rocket which stands 363 feet tall.

[…]

Your pledge will support design and team building aspects of the Dream Rocket project, a large scale art project based on creativity and teamwork made of thousands of artworks created by schools, groups, and individuals from around the U.S., and around the world.

Astronomy, Education, Space participation

ARKYD space telescope for public access – Kickstarter pledges rocket upwards

Planetary Resources is a company planning to mine asteroids. Initially, though, they will place small observatories into earth orbit to search for candidate near earth orbit asteroids to which they will later send probes for closer inspection. On Wednesday they announced a program to dedicate one of their space observatories to public access and education.

The ARKYD project will launch in 2015 a space telescope into orbit specifically to allow students, schools and the members of the general public to direct its observations. They opened a Kickstarter campaign to raise $1M to fund the project.

One of the cool perks for a $25 pledge is a Space Selfie in which an image that you give them will be displayed on the “satellite’s external screen overlooking Earth. We will then take a picture from our camera arm and send the image back to you.”

The concept and the perks seem very popular as the 32 day campaign has already reached in the first two days nearly $565,000 from 5674 backers. [Update June.1.13: The totals are currently at  $625,714 nd 6,234 backers.]

Here is a video for the Kickstarter:

And in the video below,

Jason Silva, the host of National Geographic’s Brain Games talks about what the ARKYD space telescope means to him and the world. You can follow Jason on Twitter @JasonSilva

Help fund citizen science and make space exploration a reality for everyone! Support the ARKYD Kickstarter http://kck.st/18DzUJ7

And here is a video with Planetary Resources co-founder Peter Diamandis and Planetary Society chief Bill Nye:

Contests and Games, Education, In Space Infrastructure

Video: NASA Lunabotics Mining Competition at KSC

NASA is holding the Lunabotics Mining Competition at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex this week.

The Lunabotics Mining Competition is a university-level competition designed to engage and retain students in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM). There is particular relevance to NASA’s recently announced mission to find an asteroid by 2016 and then bring it to Cis-Lunar space, the technology concepts developed by the university teams for this competition conceivably could be used to mine resources on Asteroids as well as Mars. Robotic miners, just like these, will allow us to take samples at the returned Asteroid and give us valuable information to prepare for other deep space missions.

The challenge is for students to design and build a remote controlled or autonomous excavator that can collect and deposit a minimum of 10 kilograms of regolith simulant (aggregate) within 10 minutes. Regolith exists not only on Earth’s moon, but also on most planetary bodies such as Asteroids, Moons of Mars and Mars itself.

The complexities of the challenge include the abrasive characteristics of the simulant, the weight and size limitations of the robot, and the ability to control it from a remote control center. The scoring for the mining category will require teams to consider a number of design operation factors such as dust tolerance and projection, communications, vehicle mass, energy/power required, and full autonomy.

Here is a video in which the camera for the first half wanders around the event hall showing the student teams preparing their lunar mining robots for the contest. The second half shows the robots in the lunar simulant arena: