Astronaut Marcus Wandt of the European Space Agency, who arrived on board the International Space Station with the Ax-3 mission, managed to control three robots from space which are instead found on Earth, more precisely within the Agency's laboratories German spacecraft Dlr.
the perfectly successful experiment is part of the Surface Avatar project launched in 2020 and managed by the German agency in collaboration with ESA, which aims to develop technology that will allow astronauts to control multiple robots simultaneously and independently.
This is therefore a further step in view of future expeditions to the Moon and Mars, where robots will be able to support humans in the exploration of these celestial bodies.
Testing began with Bert, the first four-legged robot to be guided from space.
Its particular type of locomotion allows it to move well on rough terrain and to explore objectives that are too dangerous or inaccessible for humans, such as small caves.
After taking control of Bert for a while, Wandt left him free to move independently while he switched to the humanoid robot called Rollin' Justin and the ESA Interact rover: the astronaut managed to get them to cooperate, making Rollin' Justin ' Justin held a tube in place while the rover installed it.
The experiment lasted about 2 and a half hours in total and was a success.
“Future stations on the Moon and Mars, including astronaut habitats, will be built and maintained by robots operating under their guidance,” says Alin Albu-Schäffer, director of the Dlr's Institute for Robotics and Mechatronics.
“Our latest algorithms based on Artificial Intelligence – observes Albu-Schäffer – allow a single astronaut to command an entire team of different robots”.
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