Path Planning and Navigation Inside Off-World Lava Tubes and Caves
Himangshu Kalita, Steven Morad, Jekan Thangavelautham

TL;DR
This paper proposes a novel cooperative mapping and navigation approach for exploring off-world lava tubes and caves using SphereX robots, addressing challenges like GPS absence, darkness, and complex terrain.
Contribution
It introduces new techniques for localized, cooperative mapping and navigation tailored for low-gravity, GPS-denied cave environments using hopping and flying robots.
Findings
Effective localization without GPS in cave environments
Successful cooperative mapping with SphereX robots
Enhanced exploration capabilities in low-light, complex terrains
Abstract
Detailed surface images of the Moon and Mars reveal hundreds of cave-like openings. These cave-like openings are theorized to be remnants of lava-tubes and their interior maybe in pristine conditions. These locations may have well preserved geological records of the Moon and Mars, including evidence of past water flow and habitability. Exploration of these caves using wheeled rovers remains a daunting challenge. These caves are likely to have entrances with caved-in ceilings much like the lava-tubes of Arizona and New Mexico. Thus, the entrances are nearly impossible to traverse even for experienced human hikers. Our approach is to utilize the SphereX robot, a 3 kg, 30 cm diameter robot with computer hardware and sensors of a smartphone attached to rocket thrusters. Each SphereX robot can hop, roll or fly short distances in low gravity, airless or low-pressure environments. Several…
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