In the past, the program benefited several NASA efforts, including modern air traffic control systems, Earth observing spacecraft, the space Shuttle, the International space Station and Mars rovers.
For convenience, the team suggests having 'Mars standard' RTG batteriesthat can be plugged into other rovers, equipment and habitats.
Besides being slow (top speed 0.2kph) and at risk of sand traps, wheeled rovers like Spirit and Opportunity have other limitations.
After a year of stunning successes by NASA's twin Mars rovers Spirit and Opportunity, it is hard to remember just how much tension surrounded the two landings.
It's been said that the Mars rovers that have been on Mars since 2004 have done about as much work as a single, two-man Apollo crew would do in a day.
IRobot has been building larger robotic rovers that are used for bomb disposal and other hazardous tasks, but the challenge was putting everything into a five-pound package that doesn't fall apart.
He has worked on rovers since well before they landed in 2004.
The "Emergency Rescue Task" required that teams use coordinates to navigate their rovers to a distressed astronaut and deliver a supply package.
The downside of small, lightweight throw-able robots is that they can't carry as many sensor packages, have smaller batteries and smaller range than the big rovers.
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