NASA releases photos of a new backpack it designed to help astronauts navigate the moon in the dark
Advertisement
Marianne Guenot
Apr 22, 2022, 22:40 IST
NASA's Kinematic Navigation and Cartography Knapsack (KNaCK) aims to help astronauts navigate in areas of poor visibility.NASA/Michael Zanetti/Insider
NASA has developed a backpack-sized sensor to help moon astronauts map their surroundings.
The sensor would build a 3D map in real-time to help them navigate uncharted or dark terrain.
Advertisement
NASA has released images of a backpack-sized sensor it is developing to help astronauts navigate terrain in future expeditions to the Moon.
The Kinematic Navigation and Cartography Knapsack (KNaCK) is designed to help astronauts walk around areas that are uncharted or have with very low visibility, like the south pole of the Moon, NASA said in a release Wednesday.
The animation below shows what the landing of a drone would look like using this technology.
KNaCK is based on lidar, a technology that uses light the way a bat uses sound to echolocate. The sensor pulses the light to map out the surroundings of the astronauts in 3D.
In an environment like the Moon, there is no GPS to help with navigation as of now.
Advertisement
So the tool, which maps in real-time, can help the astronauts know how far they've come and how far the next object is, Dr. Michael Zanetti, who leads the KNaCK project in Huntsville, Alabama, said in the statement.
The sensor can be carried around as a small backpack and can also be mounted on rovers.
The system could also help astronauts navigate areas where the visibility is very poor, like the south pole of the moon, where the sun never rises more than three degrees above the horizon, leaving much of the terrain in permanent deep shadow, per the statement.
NASA aims to resume manned excursions to the Moon soon with its series of Artemis missions, which should include the first-ever visit to its south pole, per the statement.
Advertisement
Late last year, the agency pushed the timeline for its first human moon landing to 2025, prompting top officials to worry that China could beat the US there, as Insider previously reported.
NewsletterSIMPLY PUT - where we join the dots to inform and inspire you. Sign up for a weekly brief collating many news items into one untangled thought delivered straight to your mailbox.
The CDC finally has a simple interactive tool that tells you when to test yourself and how long to quarantine if you're exposed to COVID. Here's how it works.
The CDC is warning of a mysterious and dangerous rash of liver-injuring hepatitis cases in kids
Astronomers say a new type of stellar explosion on distant dead stars — called 'micronova' — could be plentiful in our universe