About this book:

"Robotics for Planetary Exploration" delves into the intricate design, operational strategies, and autonomous capabilities required for robots to map, sample, and build on extraterrestrial bodies. The book establishes that planetary environments necessitate fundamentally different robot designs compared to terrestrial applications, citing challenges such as low gravity, abrasive dust, extreme temperatures, radiation, and communication delays. It integrates four core pillars: mobility systems for traversing varied terrains, manipulation systems for interacting with the environment, autonomy algorithms for decision-making, and robust field operations for reliable performance.

The text comprehensively covers the engineering principles behind these pillars. It details mobility fundamentals, from wheeled and tracked designs to legged locomotion, emphasizing how these systems interact with loose soils, rocks, and slopes under varying gravitational forces. Power and thermal systems are explored, highlighting the trade-offs between solar arrays, batteries, and radioisotope thermoelectric generators (RTGs) in managing energy and temperature extremes. Perception sensors like cameras, lidar, and radar are discussed as the robot's "eyes," feeding into state estimation and mapping techniques, including multi-modal SLAM, to enable autonomous navigation and terrain assessment. Manipulation systems, encompassing arms, end-effectors, drills, and corers, are presented as critical for scientific sampling and future construction tasks, stressing the importance of precision, contamination control, and sample curation.

The book places significant emphasis on autonomy architectures and flight software, which serve as the robot's "brain" to interpret commands, monitor health, plan actions, and react to unforeseen events within resource constraints. It explores the role of onboard AI, including computer vision and learning algorithms, in enhancing perception and decision-making while grappling with limited processing power and data. Verification and validation are presented as continuous processes, utilizing simulation, hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) testing, and terrestrial analog field campaigns to ensure mission readiness and robustness.

Finally, "Robotics for Planetary Exploration" provides extensive case studies, tracing the evolution of Mars rovers from the pioneering Sojourner to the sophisticated Perseverance, showcasing increasing capabilities in landing, mobility, scientific instrumentation, and autonomy. It also looks to near-term lunar missions under initiatives like CLPS and the Artemis program, highlighting the shift towards commercial partnerships, in-situ resource utilization (ISRU), and multi-robot teams. These concepts, including scout-and-workhorse models, swarms, and orbiter-surface cooperation, are presented as the future of sustained planetary presence, where robots not only explore but actively build, maintain, and produce in preparation for human habitation.

What You'll Find Inside:

• Integrates four pillars of planetary robotics: mobility, manipulation, autonomy, and field operations, emphasizing the practical engineering required to transform mission goals into reliable, field-ready systems.
• Details the design principles for robots to survive and function in extreme planetary environments, accounting for low gravity, abrasive regolith, radiation, extreme temperatures, and electrostatic dust.
• Provides actionable guidance on systems engineering, mission architectures, and requirements, including risk management and trade studies that are essential for developing a flyable system from a promising concept.
• Covers the design and mechanics of mobility systems, including wheels, tracks, and legs, and their interaction with challenging terrain like loose soils, rocks, and slopes.
• Presents real-world case studies from Mars rovers (Pathfinder to Perseverance) and lunar prototypes (CLPS, Artemis) to illustrate how incremental advances compound into greater capabilities.

Who's It For:

This book is written for robotics engineers and mission designers who need a practical blueprint for developing robots that can map, sample, and build on other worlds. Whether you are sizing motors for a micro-rover, designing a sampling drill, or crafting an autonomy stack, this book provides the guidance needed to connect subsystem choices to mission outcomes. It will be especially valuable for those working on planetary rovers, landers, and ISRU systems who need a single, authoritative reference for design principles, operational strategies, and the engineering realities of planetary exploration.