Carnegie Mellon University researchers teamed up with scientists at NASA to develop a robot capable of searching underwater oceans on distant planets for signs of life. (See video below.)
NASA’s Exobiology Extant Life Surveyor (EELS) is a self-propelled, autonomous, snake-like robot inspired by a desire to one day look for signs of life in the vast ocean beneath the icy crust of Saturn’s Enceladus moon.
The robot can autonomously navigate extreme terrain, enabling it to traverse not only ice but also sand, rocks, cliff walls, deep craters, underground lava tubes and glaciers. [Read more…] about CMU scientists contribute to NASA’s autonomous robot snake