SpaceClimber: Development of a Six-Legged Climbing Robot for Space Exploration

Abstract

In this paper, we present the SpaceClimber integration study, a six-legged, bio-inspired, energy-efficient, and adaptable free-climbing robot for mobility in steep gradients. The long-term vision is to provide a system for the purpose of extraterrestrial surface exploration missions paying special attention to mobility in lunar craters in order to retrieve or analyze scientific samples from the interior of these craters. We present an envisaged mission for SpaceClimber and give a description of the system's morphology and the design steps. Apart from hardware design, parts of the control software as well as the utilization of evolutionary algorithms for both morphology design and locomotion control are presented.