#autonomous_robots

India plans to build a space station by 2035 India plans to send astronauts to the moon by 2040 and build a space station in the middle of the next decade. The announcement came after a meeting chaired by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to assess the progress of the Gaganyaan mission to send humans into space. “The Prime Minister indicated that India should strive for new and ambitious goals, including the establishment of the Indian space station Bharatiya Antariksha Station by 2035 and sending the first Indian to the Moon by 2040,” the government statement said. India plans the first manned flight in 2025. [caption id="attachment_72165" align="aligncenter" width="780"] robot missions[/caption] Meanwhile, NASA plans to send a manned mission to the Moon's South Pole in December 2025 as part of the Artemis program. China has also announced a goal of sending two taikonauts to the moon by 2030. The Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) is preparing for the unmanned test flight of Flight Test Vehicle Abort Mission-1 (TV-D1) from the Satish Dhawan Launch Center on October 21. The mission will be conducted to test the crew rescue system. It will be launched to test the separation of the crew capsule from the test apparatus. The capsule with the crew will be lowered by parachute to the sea about 10 kilometers off the coast of Sriharikot. The announcement of lunar plans follows India's successes with the landing of the robotic mission Chandrayaan-3 on the Moon and the launch of the Aditya L1 solar observatory. The statement also outlines India's plans for space exploration beyond the Moon. ISRO will develop an action plan for lunar exploration. This plan will include a series of Chandrayaan missions, the development of the Next Generation Launch Vehicle (NGLV), the construction of a new launch complex, and establishment of laboratories. The Prime Minister also called for work on interplanetary missions, including a Venus orbiter and a Mars lander. India sent its first interplanetary mission, the Mission to Mars (MOM), in 2013. It entered Mars orbit in September 2014 and operated for almost eight years. This year, India also introduced reforms aimed at increasing private companies in the space sector and attracting global capital.

British company Asteroid Mining Corp. introduced the SCAR-E robot for asteroid exploration. The organization plans to use the robot on space missions, including lunar exploration and asteroid mining. British company Asteroid Mining Corp. introduced the SCAR-E robot. Despite the name, Asteroid Mining Corp. does not expect the market for space resources to be fully realized soon. “We are a robotics company with asteroid mining ambitions. Space resources is a very exciting industry. But let’s be honest, it’s not fully formed yet,” said the CEO and founder of Asteroid Mining Corp. Mitch Hunter-Scullion. Shortly, this London-based startup will offer services using the SCAR-E (Space Capable Asteroid Robotic-Explorer) robot, which weighs 20 kg and has six legs. [caption id="attachment_69208" align="aligncenter" width="780"] SCAR-E robot[/caption] “We can challenge Boston Dynamics. We have six legs, while they only have four. Our strategy is to capture the industrial inspection market and penetrate places that are inaccessible to four-legged robots,” said Hunter-Scullion introduced the SCAR-E robot for asteroid exploration and challenged the “four-legged” from Boston Dynamics With grippers attached to its legs, SCAR-E will be able to crawl along walls and perform hull inspections and other engineering tasks. It will be able to explore asteroids and lunar craters - the mechanical and electronic components of SCAR-E will be carefully isolated from lunar dust. Wheeled rovers have proven useful on the Moon or Mars, but may struggle on steep slopes. You can't get to Shackleton Crater on the Moon on wheels. The privately held Asteroid Mining Corp., founded in 2016, calls itself Britain's first space-based asteroid mining company. In addition to the London office, the company has a research laboratory in the Japanese prefecture of Sendai and a subsidiary in Atlanta. After the re-launch of SCAR-E, Asteroid Mining Corp. plans to develop a satellite for processing mined materials Alchemist-1. “We are considering the possibility of using this robot on the International Space Station and the Moon as early as 2026-2027. And by the end of this decade, if not before the 2030s, we plan to take this robot or its successor to asteroids to begin resource development."