NASA plans to send three mini rovers to the Moon as part of their CADRE (Cooperative Autonomous Distributed Robotic Exploration) project. They are set to arrive in 2024 for NASA’s CLPS (Commercial Lunar Payload Services) initiative and will be lowered by tethers onto the Reiner Gamma region of the Moon.
These suitcase-sized rovers will then proceed to find a spot to unfurl their solar panels and charge up their systems before spending 14 days conducting experiments including mapping the lunar surface in 3D using cameras as well as ground-penetrating radar. The only human instructions they’ll receive from mission controllers is ‘go explore this region’, and each rover then figures out how best to safely complete its assigned task.
- Feed a passion for science and technology – Kids can learn more about the challenges of space exploration with this LEGO Technic NASA Mars Rover...
- Conduct a test flight – This advanced building kit for kids ages 10 and up includes a buildable toy version of NASA’s Ingenuity helicopter, which...
- AR brings the mission to life – The accompanying augmented reality app experience lets kids dive into the details of the rover and its mission
Our mission is to demonstrate that a network of mobile robots can cooperate to accomplish a task without human intervention – autonomously. It could change how we do exploration in the future. The question for future missions will become: ‘How many rovers do we send, and what will they do together?,” said Subha Comandur, the CADRE project manager at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California.
