Avoiding Sand Traps Robots have helped humans navigate outer
space, land on the moon and explore Mars — but they can still
get stuck in the sand. Carnegie Mellon University's
internationally renowned roboticist, William "Red" Whittaker, is
leading a new NASA-funded study to keep them moving forward.
"Robots are increasingly effective at modeling terrain and
navigating from A to B, but robots remain blind to mission-
ending sinkage, slippage and buried hazards," Whittaker
explained. He noted that one Mars rover has already become
entrapped by sinking in hazardous terrain, and the Apollo
astronauts once had to push their moon buggy out of trouble.
Whittaker is the director of CMU's Field Robotics Center and the
Fredkin University Professor of Robotics, as well as the CEO of
Astrobotic Technology. NASA awarded contracts to both Astrobotic
and CMU for their portions of the new study, one of eight
advanced robotics projects funded by NASA in an effort to
advance the frontiers of space exploration. The winning proje