Computational Intelligence - November 2013 - 52

Application
Notes

Peter Yuen,
Mullard Space Science Laboratory, UCL, UK
Yang Gao, Surrey Space Centre,
University of Surrey, UK

ExoMars Rover PanCam:
Autonomy and Computational Intelligence

I. Introduction

a

s a part of the Aurora programme for
Mars exploration, funded by the
United Kingdom Space Agency
(UKSA) and European Space Agency
(ESA), the UK contributes to the Exobiology on Mars (ExoMars) rover science
and engineering programme, with a
scheduled launch in 2018; Hence, our
Panoramic Camera (PanCam) [9][15]
research and development (R&D) is
timely. PanCam consists of two stereo
Wide Angle Cameras (WAC) and one
High Resolution Camera (HRC). While
the development is still ongoing, we used
funding awarded by the University College London (UCL) Graduate School to
conduct investigations in the Himalayas
and at Mount Everest Base Camp (EBC),
according to the ExoMars rover Reference Surface Mission (RSM). The investigations included capturing stereo
and high resolution images using stereo
WAC emulators and HRC emulator at
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MCI.2013.2279561
Date of publication: 16 October 2013

Dongjoe Shin, Computer Laboratory,
University of Cambridge, UK

altitudes 3490 m, 5150 m and above.
Images from different WAC filters, and
color images from HRC were acquired
at various Pan and Tilt Unit (PTU) mast
positions. Our investigation results show
significant reduction in data volume with
minimum loss in image quality. Furthermore, we introduce a novel autonomous
and computational intelligent system
called Mission-Specific Data Processor
(MSDP) for the rover. It includes PanCam, Visual Data Fusion (VDF), Learning-enabled Object Detection (LOD),
Self-Learning Agent (SLA) [22], and
Environment Model Library (EML)
as part of the rover's computational
intelligence [7].
UCL Mullard Space Science Laboratory (MSSL) has been involved in the
ExoMars mission since 2003. It includes
scientific research, detailed design and
development of PanCam as shown in
Figure 1. Given the Martian atmospheric pressure of less than 14 hectopascal (hPa), high UV flux 50 W/m 2
[21], extreme temperature fluctuations
between -120 °C and +27 °C in a Sol

Left
WAC

Right HRC
WAC

(a)

(b)

Figure 1 (a) ExoMars rover (courtesy ESA). (b) PanCam.

52

Andrew Griffiths, Andrew Coates,
Jan-Peter Muller, Alan Smith, Dave Walton,
Craig Leff, and Barry Hancock
Mullard Space Science Laboratory, UCL, UK

IEEE ComputatIonal IntEllIgEnCE magazInE | novEmbEr 2013

(one Sol is equivalent to 24 hr 39 min
35.24409 sec), and at 300 parts per million (i.e. 300 mg/kg) Water Vapor Fraction (WVF) is more of a trace constituent; we selected the Himalayan region
and EBC to conduct our investigations
in Summer 2010, a year after the
National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) ran their experiments
at Mount Everest [6]. The chosen sites
for investigation have typical pressure
483 hPa, UV flux 30 W/m2, daily temperature varies between -50 °C at
night and +46 °C during daytime, and
WVF 1100 mg/kg (dry air).
ExoMars rover RSM is a set of daily
plans [2] [13] which are performed
within the nominal surface mission
duration as defined in Table 1. It consists
of PanCam operational timeline sequences
in a number of the Sols; these sequences
handle functions such as WAC and
HRC autoexposure, autofocus for
HRC, images acquisition, iteration, time
delay, thermal control and cameras
mode switching.
As shown in Figure 2(a) and (b),
WAC RRGB stereo panorama timeline
sequence PC_WAC_STC_PAN captures images by using the Red (R) filter
at the left Filter Wheel (FW); and Red,
Green, Blue (RGB) filters of the right
FW. For example, there are six PTU mast
positions during Sol 6, whereas in Sol 7
it has twelve PTU positions, but in Sol 1
and Sol 8 both operate with ten positions. When the rover moves away from
the landing site at Sol 22, the same timeline sequence will perform a 360° panorama. However, we only have one PTU

1556-603x/13/$31.00©2013IEEE



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