Rover Mission

Rover missions are pushing the boundaries of autonomous exploration on planetary surfaces, focusing on improving navigation and localization capabilities for longer, more independent traverses. Current research emphasizes robust traversability assessment using probabilistic machine learning models that account for terrain uncertainty and adapt to new environments, alongside autonomous global localization techniques leveraging crater features for navigation, even in darkness. These advancements are crucial for enabling extended exploration missions, particularly in challenging environments like the lunar south pole, and significantly enhance the efficiency and safety of robotic planetary exploration.