Having a skeleton crew aboard the International Space Station means forcing PhDs to pull double-duty as janitors, and sometimes to undertake dangerous space walks. NASA’s solution? Robonaut, or R2 as it’s called by shipmates on the International Space Station. Conceived of in 1997, the goal was to create a robot that would take on jobs that are too dangerous, or dull, for humans. It has been an engineering marvel: Engineers equipped R2 with arms and hands that can carry 40 pound payloads; 350 sensors feeding into 38 processors give it the ability to carefully manipulate a control panel, or even send a text message from an iPhone.
There was just one problem—it couldn’t move. R2 was either mounted on a pole or attached to a wheeled base, both non-starters in space. Now, NASA’s engineers have finally unveiled a bizarre-looking pair of legs that will help the robot crawl around.
Their design is a contrast to R2′s arms and hands. The latter had to be human-like, to be able to use the same tools as astronauts. The legs, however, had to accomplish superhuman feats. The gear-filled gams can span nine feet, featuring seven points of articulation. There are also a few extra touches, required for it to perform tasks on the ISS’s exterior.
“The legs have grippers designed specifically to grasp existing interfaces on the Space Station,” says Rob Ambrose, Chief of the Software and Robotics Division at NASA’s Johnson Space Center. “The grippers serve as feet, but unlike an astronaut wearing boots, Robonaut has the ability to climb with its legs, freeing its hands to carry objects or do work.” A team of eight engineers spent years and over $15 million dollars developing the legs that would make it flight ready, and the hope is to install them early this year.
The next step will be upgrading R2′s chassis with extra shielding from electromagnetic radiation and supports to withstand the vacuum of space so it can take on dangerous extravehicular missions. “No close calls like Gravity have occurred,” says Ambrose, but all the same, he likes the idea of onboard robots that can operate independently outside of a spacecraft. “A robot can hold its breath a long time, making it a potentially valuable and diverse member of the crew,” he says, drolly. Despite their cost, robots are still fairly disposable and can be left behind in an emergency evacuation or as a caretaker waiting for humans to return.
“The environment of space is unusual to us on Earth,” says Ambrose. Zero gravity, deadly vacuums, and extreme swings in temperature make stints aboard the ISS challenging—for some. “It’s tough for people, but a good application for robots.”
With NASA’s shuttle fleet grounded, limited space funding available in a post-sequester world, and plenty of upgrades still pending, it might be a while before R2 makes meaningful contributions in orbit, but the process of developing the ‘bot yielded a bevy of patentable inventions. Innovations in vision systems, control algorithms, and sensor integrations could be applied to terrestrial robots in manufacturing. The millions of dollars spent developing the legs could eventually help the paralyzed walk again in the form of new medically focused exoskeletons.
Even if R2 never makes it to the stars, NASA is using what it learned to develop a next-gen, 6′ 2″ bot called Valkyrie, which is designed to search for and recover survivors in disaster zones on Earth, or in the future, a Martian wasteland. It hasn’t fared well in early trials, but then again, some of NASA’s greatest accomplishments have begun with one small step.