Portrait of Life in the Atacama
Head: David Wettergreen
Contact: David Wettergreen
Associated Lab: Field Robotics Center (FRC)
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Last Project Publication Year: 2016

For the most current information, see our official project page.

Evidence suggests that the interior of the Chilean Atacama Desert, the most arid region on Earth, is also the most lifeless. Yet where the desert meets the Pacific Coastal Range desiccation-tolerant microorganisms are known to exist. In some areas of the desert interior bacteria survive in porous rock and the under the surface crust of salty soils. The gradient of biodiversity and variety of habitats of life in the Atacama’s subregions remain largely unexplored.

Robotic field investigation will bring new scientific understanding of the Atacama as a habitat for life with distinct analogies to Mars. Our goal is to make genuine discoveries about the limits of life on Earth and to generate knowledge about life in extreme environments that can be applied to future planetary missions. To conduct this investigation we have developed Robotic Astrobiology.

Field investigation over three years will use a rover to make transects of the Atacama with instruments to detect microorganisms and to characterize habitats. The rover will integrate panoramic imagers, microscopic imagers, spectrometers, as well as a drill for shallow subsurface access. Robotic considerations in addition to instrument integration include planetary-relevant localization, over-the-horizon navigation, power-cognizant planning, and science data understanding

The measurement and exploration techniques produced by this investigation combines long traverses, sampling measurements on a regional scale and detailed measurements of individual targets. When compared to the state of the art in robotic planetary exploration our approach will result in dramatic increase in the number of measurements made and data collected by rover instruments per command cycle. This result will translate into substantial productivity increases for future planetary exploration missions.

Displaying 22 Publications
PhD Thesis, Tech. Report, CMU-RI-TR-16-57, Robotics Institute, Carnegie Mellon University, October, 2016
Conference Paper, Proceedings of (IROS) IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems, pp. 775 - 782, November, 2013
David Wettergreen, Michael D. Wagner, Dominic Jonak, Vijayakumar Baskaran, Matthew Deans, Stuart Heys, David Pane, Trey Smith, James Teza, David R. Thompson, Paul Tompkins and Chris Williams
Conference Paper, Proceedings of 9th International Symposium on Artificial Intelligence, Robotics and Automation in Space (iSAIRAS '08), February, 2008
Journal Article, Journal of Solar Energy Engineering, Vol. 129, No. 3, pp. 343 - 346, August, 2007
Tech. Report, CMU-RI-TR-06-32, Robotics Institute, Carnegie Mellon University, July, 2006
Journal Article, Robotics and Autonomous Systems: Special Issue on Intelligent Autonomous Systems, Vol. 54, No. 2, pp. 174 - 183, February, 2006
Conference Paper, Proceedings of 8th International Symposium on Artificial Intelligence, Robotics and Automation in Space (iSAIRAS '05), September, 2005
Conference Paper, Proceedings of 8th International Symposium on Artificial Intelligence, Robotics and Automation in Space (iSAIRAS '05), September, 2005
Conference Paper, Proceedings of 8th International Symposium on Artificial Intelligence, Robotics and Automation in Space (iSAIRAS '05), September, 2005
David Wettergreen, Nathalie Cabrol, Vijayakumar Baskaran, Francisco Calderon, Stuart Heys, Dominic Jonak, Rolf Allan Luders, David Pane, Trey Smith, James Teza, Paul Tompkins, Daniel Villa, Chris Williams and Michael D. Wagner
Conference Paper, Proceedings of 8th International Symposium on Artificial Intelligence, Robotics and Automation in Space (iSAIRAS '05), September, 2005
Conference Paper, Proceedings of (IROS) IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems, pp. 448 - 453, August, 2005
Conference Paper, Proceedings of (ICRA) International Conference on Robotics and Automation, pp. 873 - 878, April, 2005
Shmuel Weinstein, David Pane, Lauren A. Ernst, Edwin Minkley, Fred Lanni, David Wettergreen, Michael D. Wagner, Stuart Heys, James Teza and Alan Waggoner
Conference Paper, Proceedings of 36th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference (LPSC '05), March, 2005
James M. Dohm, Nathalie A. Cabrol, Edmond A. Grin, Jeffrey Moersch, Guillermo Chong Diaz, Charles Cockell, Peter Coppin, Gregory Fisher, Andrew N. Hock, Lucia Marinangeli, Edwin Minkley, G. G. Ori, Jennifer L. Piatek, Kim Warren-Rhodes, Shmuel Weinstein, Michael Wyatt, Trey Smith, Michael D. Wagner, Kristen Stubbs, Geb Thomas and Justin Glasgow
Conference Paper, Proceedings of 36th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference (LPSC '05), March, 2005
David Wettergreen, Nathalie Cabrol, William (Red) L. Whittaker, Guillermo Chong Diaz, Francisco Calderon, Stuart Heys, Dominic Jonak, Rolf Allan Luders, Jeffrey Moersch, David Pane, Marion Smith, Kristen Stubbs, James Teza, Paul Tompkins, Daniel Villa, Chris Williams, Michael D. Wagner, Alan Waggoner, Shmuel Weinstein and Michael Wyatt
Conference Paper, Proceedings of 36th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference (LPSC '05), March, 2005
Nathalie A. Cabrol, David Wettergreen, William (Red) L. Whittaker, Edmond A. Grin, Jeffrey Moersch, Guillermo Chong Diaz, Charles Cockell, Peter Coppin, James M. Dohm, Gregory Fisher, Andrew N. Hock, Lucia Marinangeli, Edwin Minkley, G. G. Ori, Jennifer Piatek, Alan Waggoner, Kim Warren-Rhodes, Shmuel Weinstein, Michael Wyatt, Francisco Calderon, Stuart Heys, Dominic Jonak, Rolf Allan Luders, David Pane, Trey Smith, Kristen Stubbs, James Teza, Paul Tompkins, Daniel Villa, Chris Williams, Michael D. Wagner, Geb Thomas and Justin Glasgow
Conference Paper, Proceedings of 36th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference (LPSC '05), March, 2005
Jennifer L. Piatek, Jeffrey E. Moersch, Michael Wyatt, Michael Rampey, Nathalie A. Cabrol, David Wettergreen, William (Red) L. Whittaker, Edmond A. Grin, Guillermo Chong Diaz, Charles Cockell, Peter Coppin, James M. Dohm, Gregory Fisher, Andrew N. Hock, Lucia Marinangeli, Edwin Minkley, G. G. Ori, Alan Waggoner, Kim Warren-Rhodes, Shmuel Weinstein, Dimitrios (Dimi) Apostolopoulos, Trey Smith, Michael D. Wagner, Kristen Stubbs, Geb Thomas and Justin Glasgow
Conference Paper, Proceedings of 36th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference (LPSC '05), March, 2005
Shmuel Weinstein, David Pane, Kim Warren-Rhodes, Charles Cockell, Lauren A. Ernst, Edwin Minkley, Gregory Fisher, Sujata Emani, David Wettergreen, Michael D. Wagner, Nathalie Cabrol and Alan Waggoner
Conference Paper, Proceedings of 36th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference (LPSC '05), March, 2005
Eben Myers, Peter Coppin, Michael D. Wagner, Karl Fischer, Dan Luisa Lu, Ron McCloskey, David Seneker, Nathalie Cabrol, David Wettergreen and Alan Waggoner
Conference Paper, Proceedings of 36th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference (LPSC '05), March, 2005
Journal Article, International Journal of Robotics Research, Vol. 24, No. 1, pp. 3 - 30, January, 2005
Workshop Paper, ICML '03 Workshop on Machine Learning Technologies for Autonomous Space Applications, August, 2003

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