Robonaut 2, the first humanoid robot in space, was sent to the International Space Station with the intention of eventually taking over tasks too dangerous or mundane for astronauts, (see "Robonaut 2 on the ISS") and the first such task identified for it was monitoring air velocity. Astronauts onboard the space station generally have to measure the air flow in front of vents inside the station to ensure that none of the ventilation ductwork gets clogged or blocked. The task involves holding a gauge in front of vents in five different locations on the station and taking several measurements of the air flow every 90 days or so.
To successfully complete the task Robonaut 2 has to overcome several challenges. For one, the gauge has to be held very steady – a challenge for a human being bobbing up and down in microgravity. And the samples can be misleading if there’s another source of air flow in the area – such as a human being’s breath.
Recently, the robot successfully gave the team watching from the ground two good samples taken in front of a ventilation diffuser in the Destiny Laboratory. It wasn’t able to work through the samples as quickly as an astronaut could, and without legs it could only take samples in one area, rather than all five. But back in Mission Control, the effort was definitely counted as a success.
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Robonaut's broad mix of sensors includes thermal, position, tactile, force and torque instrumentation, with over 150 sensors per arm. The control system includes an onboard, real time CPU with miniature data acquisition and power management in a small, environmentally hardened body. Off-board guidance is delivered with human supervision using a telepresence control station with human tracking.
Robonaut 2 uses Harwin’s Mix-Tek Datamate connectors in its head and arms. The company noted that the manipulator and dexterous hand have been developed “with a substantial investment in mechatronics design. The arm structure has embedded avionics elements within each link, reducing cabling and noise contamination. Unlike some systems, Robonaut uses a chordate approach to data management, bringing all feedback to a central nervous system, where even low-level servo control is performed. This biologically-inspired neurological approach is extended to left-right computational symmetry, sensor and power duality and kinematical redundancy, enabling learning and optimization in mechanical, electrical and software form.”