Mars Curiosity Rover Can Now Decide Where to Fire its Laser

From Popular Mechanics

The Mars rover Curiosity has begun choosing some of its own targets for its ChemCam, the laser it uses to pulverize rocks and analyze their chemical makeup. This new autonomous capability will be useful for the many times NASA scientists on Earth are out of sync with the rover's schedule on the Red Planet. When it can't talk to Earth, Curiosity will make its own decisions.

Curiosity touched down on Mars in 2012, on a mission to determine if the planet ever could have supported microscopic life. In that time, Curiosity has analyzed 1,400 targets, firing its laser 350,000 times. With the addition of autonomy, the laser may get even more of a workout.

"This autonomy is particularly useful at times when getting the science team in the loop is difficult or impossible - in the middle of a long drive, perhaps, or when the schedules of Earth, Mars and spacecraft activities lead to delays in sharing information between the planets," said NASA robotics engineer Tara Estlin in a statement.

The new capability, designed by Estlin, is being called Autonomous Exploration for Gathering Increased Science (AEGIS).

"To select a target autonomously, the software's analysis of images uses adjustable criteria specified by scientists, such as identifying rocks based on their size or brightness," NASA says. "The criteria can be changed depending on the rover's surroundings and the scientific goals of the measurements."

This use of basic AI points to a future where scientists on Earth will not need to be quite as involved in the movements and missions of their space explorers.

Source: Seeker