Bioinspired engineering of exploration systems for NASA and DoD

Area of Science:

• Robotics and Autonomous Systems
• Biomimicry
• Aerospace Engineering

Background:

• Insects exhibit remarkable navigation and perception despite limited neural capacity.
• Insect strategies offer computationally simple solutions for complex environmental interactions.
• Mammalian retinas process visual information in parallel, offering insights for pattern recognition.

Purpose of the Study:

• To introduce the bioinspired engineering of exploration systems (BEES) approach.
• To leverage insect and mammalian visual processing for advanced autonomous systems.
• To address critical NASA and DoD needs in space and planetary exploration.

Main Methods:

• Distilling insect-inspired strategies for navigation, hazard avoidance, and flight control.
• Modeling insect visual processing using semiconductor cellular nonlinear network (CNN) chips.
• Integrating insect navigation with mammalian visual search and pattern recognition for hybrid systems.

Main Results:

• Development of novel solutions for autonomous flight systems.
• Demonstration of potential for lightweight, low-power biomorphic flyers.
• Exploration of hybrid systems blending insect and mammalian visual processing.

Conclusions:

• BEES offers a viable approach for developing advanced autonomous robotic explorers.
• Hybrid biomorphic flyers present unique capabilities for future space missions, including Mars exploration.
• The BEES approach has significant implications for both NASA and DoD applications.