Credit: NASA’s Ames Research Center
NASA has announced the completion of software tests for its moon rover prototype.
The rover is part of VIPER mission and is managed by NASA’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley.
The robot is scheduled to be delivered to Mons Mouton near the South Pole of the moon in late 2024.
Transportation of the rover will be carried out by Astrobotic’s Griffin lander as part of the Commercial Lunar Payload Services initiative.
During the testing, the model executed various commands that will be replicated on the moon’s surface.
What’s more, it is hoped that future Artemis landing sites will be supported by the rover, which will be used to help characterise the lunar environment by determining locations where water and other resources could be harvested.
Finding essential resources means they could be used to sustain astronauts over several days upon landing.
Some of the other kay aims of the mission include assessing how frozen water and other resources came to be on the moon in the first place, as well as identifying their origin and how they might have been preserved over billions of years.
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