Abstract
In 1985, NASA instituted a research program in Telerobotics to develop and provide the technology for applications of telerobotics to the United States Space program. The purpose of this paper is to describe the goals, organizing framework and content of that endeavor. The body of the paper reviews the actual tasks which comprise the content of the program which is now seven years old and has evolved significantly in terms of its content, goals and approach. The lessons learned in that time comprise the organizing framework of the current program. This organizing framework is also described.
Similar content being viewed by others
Explore related subjects
Discover the latest articles, news and stories from top researchers in related subjects.References
W. Fisher and C. Price, “Space Station Freedom external maintenance task team,” Final Report, vol. I, parts 1 and 2, July 1990.
Space Shuttle System—Payload Accommodations, JSC-07700, vol. 14, Payload deployment and retrieval systems (remote manipulator systems) appendix 8, revision J (May 22, 1988), change 1 (June 14, 1989).
W. Zimmerman and P. Backes, “Documentation of space station telerobotics system technology: Shared control,” JPL-D-8574 (Internal Document), April 1991.
S. Hayati, T. Lee, K. Tso, P. Backes, and J. Lloyd, “A unified teleoperated-autonomous dual-arm robotic system,” IEEE Control Systems, pp. 3–8, 1991.
K. Kuraoka, K. Goma, T. Sumi, and R. Okamura, “Design and development status of the JEMRMS,” Proceedings of i-SAIRAS '90, Kobe, Japan, 1990, pp. 23–26.
T. Iwata, M. Oda, and T. Nakamura, “Ground and flying testbed for the 2nd generation space robot,”, Proceedings of i-SAIRAS '90, Kobe, Japan, 1990, pp. 49–52.
F. Christie, “Research and development program in automation and robotics in support of Canada's mobile servicing system for the Space Station Freedom,” Proceedings of i-SAIRAS '90, Kobe, Japan, 1990, pp. 15–18.
D. Hunter, “Automation of mobile servicing system operations,” Proceedings of i-SAIRAS '90, Kobe, Japan, 1990, pp. 41–44.
M. Rhodes, R. Will, and M. Wise, “A telerobotic system for automated assembly of large space structures,” NASA-TM-101518, March, 1989.
R. Will and M. Rhodes, “An automated assembly system for large space structures,” Proceedings of the SPIE Symposium on Advances in Intelligent Systems, Cooperative Intelligent Robotics in Space, Boston, MA, 1990.
W. Harrison, Jr. and J. Pennington, “System architecture for telerobotic servicing and assembly tasks,” Proceedings of the SPIE Symposium on Optical and Optoelectronic Engineering, Cambridge, MA, 1986.
T. Alberts and D. Soloway, “Force control of a multiarm robot system,” Proceedings of the IEEE Conference on Robotics and Automation, Philadelphia, PA, 1988, pp. 1490–1496.
L. Barker and W. McKinney, Jr., “Optimized resolved rate control of seven-degree of Freedom Laboratory Telerobotic Manipulator (LTM) with application to three-dimensional graphics simulation,” NASA-TP-2938, October 1989.
W. Hankins, III and R. Mixon, “Manual control of the Langley Laboratory Telerobotic Manipulator,” Proceedings of the 1989 International Conference on Systems, Man and Cybernetics, Cambridge, MA, 1989.
E. Papadopoulos and S. Dubowsky, “On the nature of control algorithms for space manipulators,” Proceedings of the 1990 Conference on Robotics and Automation, Cincinnati, OH, 1990, pp. 1102–1108.
S. Hayati et al., “Remote Surface Inspection Project: 1991 Final Report,” JPL-3471-91-086, September, 1991.
H. Seraji, “Configuration control of redundant manipulators: Theory and implementation,” IEEE Transactions on Robotics and Automation, vol. 5, no. 4, pp. 472–490, 1989.
P. Backes et al., “A ground-remote telerobot programming and control system,” Proceedings of the Third International Symposium on robotics and Manufacturing, Recent Trends in Research, Education and Applications, Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada, 1990, pp. 435–440.
C. Weisbin and D. Perillard, “Jet Propulsion Laboratory robotic facilities and associated research,” Robotica, vol. 9, pp. 7–21, 1991.
H. Das, H. Zak, A. Bejczy, and P. Schenker, “Performance experiments with alternative advanced teleoperator control modes for a simulated solar maximum satellite repair, Proceedings of SOAR '91 Symposium (Space Operations, Applications, and Research), Houston, TX, 1991.
Z. Szakaly and A. Bejczy, “Performance capabilities of a JPL dual-arm advanced teleoperation system,” Proceedings of SOAR '90 Workshop (Space Operations, Applications, and Research), Albuquerque, NM, 1990.
P. Schenker, W. Kim, S. Venema, and A. Bejczy, “Fusing human and machine skills for remote robotic operations,” in Sensor Fusion III: 3-D Perception and Recognition, Proceedings of SPIE Symposium on Advances in Intelligent Systems, Cooperative Intelligent Robotics in Space, Boston, MA, 1990.
W. Kim, B. Hannaford, and A. Bejczy, “Shared compliance control for time-delayed telemanipulation,” Proceedings of 1st International Symposium on Measurement and Control in robotics, NASA Johnson Space Center. Houston, TX, 1990, pp. H2.3.1–H2.3.7.
P. Lee, A. Bejczy, P. Schenker, and B. Hannaford, “Telerobot configuration editor,” Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics, Los Angeles, CA, 1990 pp. 121–126.
B. Jau, “Anthropomorphic dual-arm space telemanipulation system,” Proceedings of i-SAIRAS '90, Kobe, Japan, 1990, pp. 61–64.
E. Wu, M. Diftler, J. Hwang, and J. Chladek, “A fault tolerant joint drive system for the Space Shuttle Remote Manipulator System,” Proceedings of the 1991 International Conference on Robotics and Automation, 1991, pp. 2504–2509.
D. Tesar and M. Butler, “A generalized modular architecture for robot structures,” Manufacturing Review, vol. 2, no. 2, pp. 91–117, 1989.
S. Schneider and R. Cannon, Jr., “Object impedance control for cooperative manipulation: Theory and experimental results,” Proceedings of the 1989 IEEE Conference on Robotics and Automation, Scottsdale, AZ, 1989, pp. 1076–1083.
R. Koningstein, M. Ullman, and R. CannonJr., “Computed torque control of a free-flying cooperating-arm robot,” Proceedings of the NASA Conference on Space Telerobotics, 1989, vol. V, pp. 235–243.
W. Jasper and R. Cannon, Jr., “Initial experiments in thrusterless locomotion control of a free-flying robot,” Proceedings of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, Winter Annual Meeting, Dallas, TX, 1990.
D. Rovner and R. CannonJr., “Experiments toward on-line identification and control of a very flexible one-link manipulator,” International Journal of Robotics Research, vol. 6, no. 4, pp. 3–19, 1987.
D. Akin, “Telerobotic capabilities for space operations,” Proceedings of the SPIE Conference on Cooperative Intelligent Robotics in Space, Boston, MA, 1990, pp. 359–364.
D. Akin, “Telerobotics: Neutral buoyancy simulation of space applications,”, Undersea Teleoperators and Intelligent Autonomous Machines: Proceedings of the 1986 Annual MIT Sea Grant College Program Lecture and Seminar, Cambridge, MA, 1987, pp. 45–55.
H. Stone, G. Edmonds, and K. Peterson, “The JPL Emergency Response Robotics Project,” Proceedings of the Joint Army-Navy-NASA-Air Force (JANNAF) Interagency Propulsion Conference, Safety and Environmental Protection, Kennedy Space Center, FL, 1991.
J. Wooten and T. McKechnie, “Vacuum plasma sprayed NARloy-Z,” Advanced Earth-to-Orbit Propulsion Technology 1990, NASA Conference Publication 3092, vol. 1, pp. 251–261, 1990.
Boeing Aerospace Operations, Inc., “Thermal Protection System Process Automation Study Final Report,” KSC-DM-3491, October, 1990.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Weisbin, C.R., Montemerlo, M.D. NASA's Telerobotics research program. Appl Intell 2, 113–125 (1992). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00058758
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00058758