• DocumentCode
    399695
  • Title

    Experiments and analysis of the role of solar power in limiting Mars rover range

  • Author

    Miller, David P. ; Hunt, Tim S. ; Roman, Matt J.

  • Author_Institution
    Aerosp. & Mechanical Eng., Oklahoma Univ., Norman, OK, USA
  • Volume
    1
  • fYear
    2003
  • fDate
    27-31 Oct. 2003
  • Firstpage
    317
  • Abstract
    A common explanation for the limited distance traveled by NASA´s past and planned Mars rovers is the limits of solar power. This paper explores this hypothesis and documents a series of experiments with a solar powered rover. A detailed comparison between our rover and Sojourner, with regards to power usage, is presented. Experiments and analysis clearly show that other factors dominate in limiting the range of NASA´s solar powered robots when operating on Mars.
  • Keywords
    Mars; mobile robots; planetary rovers; solar power; solar powered vehicles; Mars rover range; NASA; Sojourner; solar power; solar powered robots; Aerospace engineering; Batteries; Costs; Energy management; Mars; Mechanical engineering; Robots; Solar energy; Solar powered vehicles; Testing;
  • fLanguage
    English
  • Publisher
    ieee
  • Conference_Titel
    Intelligent Robots and Systems, 2003. (IROS 2003). Proceedings. 2003 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on
  • Print_ISBN
    0-7803-7860-1
  • Type

    conf

  • DOI
    10.1109/IROS.2003.1250647
  • Filename
    1250647