The Rover Boyz team from Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham, Amritapuri campus (110 km north of Thiruvananthapuram), is one among the five finalist teams from India at the University Rover Challenge, Mars Desert Research Station, Hanksville, Utah, United States, that will be held in the last week of May. The other teams selected from India are Hindustan Mars Rover, Hindustan University; IITB Mars Rover Team, IIT-Bombay; KMC Robophysicists, Kirori Mal College, University of Delhi; and Rudra-SRM Mars Rover, SRM University, Chennai.
The challenge is to design and build the next generation of Mars Rover that will one day work alongside human explorers in the field. The winners will receive cash prizes and a trip to the annual International Mars Society Convention to present their winning idea.
The 17-member team from Amrita comprising Aswath S (team lead), Arjun B Krishnan, Hariprasad CM, Unnikrishnan VJ, Deepu Prasad Mathew, Maya M, Chinmaya Krishna Tilak, Ragesh Ramachandran, Abin Simon, Sreekuttan T, Kalathil Praveen, Basil Kailash Dutt, Abhay Sengar, Sree Krishnan, Arun Murali, Amal Suresh and Arjun Biju cleared the Critical Design Review of the competition to be shortlisted among 22 finalist teams across the world. The competition that began in December last year saw participation from 44 teams across eight countries.
“Ours is the only team that built a six-wheeled spider-like rover. The other four teams (from India) have borrowed from the Curiosity model that is eight-wheeled. We have advanced navigational capabilities. The main challenge is to transport the rover to the Mars Desert Research Station in Utah which is four hours away from the nearest airport,” says Aswath.
The team has received Rs 6.2 lakh funds from their college, credit towards custom parts manufactured by Protocase Incorporated, Canada, and ABB Ltd, Switzerland.
The final involves five tasks, presentation, terrain traversing, sample return, equipment servicing and astronaut assistance, explains Aswath. “In the first task, we describe our rover design and functionality and in the second, the rover will need to traverse sandy, stony, and rocky fields, to test its route-finding ability. In the sample return task, we are required to collect a small sample and look for signs of extremophiles (organisms that thrive in extreme environments under high pressure and temperature). In the fourth task, the rover will have to read and follow tasks printed on a panel that include connecting pipes into fittings and reading pressure gauges. In the final task, teams are required to collect objects left in the field near given GPS coordinates,” he says.
suraksha@newindianexpress.com