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Romanian specialists will contribute to the building of one of the most sophisticated and advanced space robots - a robotic arm that will be used to gather rock and dust samples on Mars and send them to Earth.
"The Romanian team will develop three sets of electronic ground support equipment (EGSE). Two of them will be used in Italy at the Leonardo headquarters and one will be delivered directly to NASA JPL, in the USA, for the last checks before launch," the Romanian Space Association (ASR) reported on Wednesday.
The mission to return Martian samples back to Earth will see a European 2.5 metre-long robotic arm pick up tubes filled with precious soil from Mars and transfer them to a rocket for an historic interplanetary delivery.
The sophisticated robot, known as the Sample Transfer Arm or STA, will play a crucial role in the success of the Mars Sample Return campaign. The joint endeavour between NASA and ESA aims to bring back Martian samples to the best labs in our planet by 2033. The robotic arm will land on Mars to retrieve the sample tubes NASA's Perseverance rover is currently collecting from the surface. Able to "see", "feel" and take autonomous decisions, the Sample Transfer Arm will identify, pick up and transfer the tubes into the first rocket fired off another planet - the Mars Launch System, Agerpres.
GMV Romania also contributes to the Perception Unit whose development is coordinated by GMV Spain - an electronic unit that plays an important role in the handling of the robotic arm. In this unit there are cameras that provide information for the arm's algorithms so that it can recognise and pick up the samples safely.
GMV Romania contributes to the mechanical and structural design for the Perception Unit, carried out by a group of sub-contractors from several countries. The Romanian team also offers support to colleagues in Spain for the development of algorithms that help the arm to "see" its surroundings.
"The contribution of the Romanian industry and research community to this pioneering NASA-ESA mission is the concrete result of ASR's efforts to promote the development in the country of relevant capabilities for planetary exploration missions. We have supported Romania's participation in the optional programme of the European Space Agency robotic and manned exploration precisely to give Romanian space players a chance to participate in ESA projects, to increase their degree of technological maturity and to have an exchange of knowledge between Romanian and European specialists and even the United States of America," says Marius-Ioan Piso, Chairman of the Romanian Space Agency (ASR).
As a result, on the Mars Sample Return mission, equipment fully developed in Romania will fly to Mars, playing an important role in the mission's success.
The European industrial consortium involved in the construction of the arm brings together companies from Spain, France, Romania, Denmark, Greece, Switzerland and the Czech Republic, under the leadership of the Leonardo company. They will design, manufacture, integrate and test the robotic arm.
