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Andres Mora Vargas, Ruben Garcia Ruiz, Peter Wofford, Vivek Kumar, Bryce Van Ross, Aric Katterhagen, Jonathan Barlow, Lorenzo Flückiger, Jose Benavides, Trey Smith, and Maria Bualat. In Proc. Int. Aeronautical Congress (IAC), 2019.
The Astrobees are NASA's next generation free-flying robots for the International Space Station (ISS). In this paper we update Astrobee development status, describe its software, and the ground facilities used for testing. We also describe initial uses of Astrobees as a research and educational platform, including the Zero Robotics competition for students ages 12-18. Astrobees will replace the Synchronized Position Hold, Engage, Reorient, Experimental Satellites (SPHERES) on board the ISS. Astrobees will operate inside the ISS, where they will assist astronauts, ground controllers, and researchers. The Astrobee Robot Software is the open-source, Robot Operating System (ROS) based software in charge of Astrobees' autonomous operation. The Astrobee Robot Software can be used interchangeably with an Astrobee Simulator or as Astrobee’s on board software, facilitating the robot's development. In addition to simulation-based testing, further evaluation is performed using the SPHERES "Granite Lab" and "Micro-Gravity Test Facility" (MGTF) at NASA Ames. The Granite Lab consists of a 3m x 3m granite table used to mimic microgravity conditions in three degrees of freedom (x/y/yaw) by mounting one or multiple Astrobees on mobile air bearings to eliminate friction. This facility also replicates a section of the ISS including lighting, handrails, and the Astrobee dock. The MGTF expands on the Granite Lab's capabilities by allowing an Astrobee to maneuver with 6 degrees-of-freedom (DOF). A gantry structure allows linear displacement in x-y-z, and a gimbal performs rotations about those axes. Motion is driven by a physics simulation that responds to simulated thrust command from the robot. The MGTF expands the capabilities to test Astrobee features at a higher fidelity, including path planning, obstacle avoidance, and computer vision-based mobility control algorithms. In addition to carrying out tasks to support ISS operations, Astrobee was designed to support a broad range of "guest science". Guest scientists will use Astrobees to test a variety of mobile payloads and sensors, as well as carry out experiments ranging from human-robot interaction studies to examination of fluid behavior in microgravity. Industry, academia, and government researchers can run their experiments using these free-flying robots. We describe several of the hardware and software payloads currently under development for Astrobee, and discuss the transition from SPHERES to Astrobee in the Zero Robotics program.
@InProceedings{mora19:guest_science_iac,
author = {Andres Mora Vargas and Ruben Garcia Ruiz and Peter Wofford and Vivek Kumar and Bryce Van Ross and Aric Katterhagen and Jonathan Barlow and Lorenzo Fl{\"u}ckiger and Jose Benavides and Trey Smith and Maria Bualat},
title = {{Astrobee}: Current Status and Future Use as an International Research Platform},
booktitle = {Proc. Int. Aeronautical Congress (IAC)},
year = 2019,
}
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