Tech Briefs Magazine - April 2021 - MD-18

addition to greater autonMoon, Mars, or any kind of
omous functionality. Now, the
planetary body.
team is working to design,
The team started looking at
build, and test a proto-flight,
creating a smaller version of
or flight-like, version that
the LSMS for the smaller rocould be demonstrated on a
botic landing missions that
large cargo lunar lander.
would precede a human misAs NASA establishes a sussion. The mini-LSMS has about
tainable presence on the
a six-foot reach and could add
Moon under the Artemis misa similar set of capabilities for
sions, it needs to start setting
offloading and other tasks to
up multiple elements and
the landers and could demonthere will be a wide range of
strate the LSMS technology on
tasks that could leverage the
the lunar surface at a smaller
versatility and functionality of
scale.
the LSMS.
There are some unique
The new LSMS will be simicapabilities that could be prolar in size to the original provided with that particular vertotype with about a 25-foot
sion such as charging a rover.
reach and will be able to lift
The rover could be offloaded
payloads weighing around
with the mini-LSMS and the
LSMS is a lightweight, scalable, and versatile long-reach manipulator that comone metric ton on the Moon bines high structural efficiency and robustness with the enhanced dexterity and rover could perform a mission
- equal to approximately multi-functionality of a deployable robotic arm. (Credit: NASA)
and return. Because the LSMS
2,200 pounds or the size of an
has a power connection at the
elephant. Upcoming Artemis missions
and software needed to integrate it with
tip, the rover could be recharged,
carrying science instruments, technoloa lander.
enabling it to complete another mission.
gy demonstrations, and rovers will be in
Eventually, the goal is to demonstrate
If LSMS could be mounted on a rover,
that payload size range.
the technology at a range of sizes that
it could act as a mobile tool for digging
The LSMS hardware will be spacecould interface with the smaller comand regolith operations or to lift cargo
rated and ready for further developmercial robotic landers up to larger
off of a lander. Using a mobile LSMS
ment that could make it compatible
landers. Analysis tools are being develremoves the need to land an offloading
with one or more of the landers that is
oped under the project so that different
device on every mission, which is a
selected to go to the Moon. A follow-on
size variants of LSMS can be developed
weight and cost savings.
project would develop the additional
fairly quickly for different missions.
For more information, visit https://
mechanical and electrical interfacing
LSMS is designed to operate on the
www.nasa.gov/langley.

High-Torque Light-Powered Actuator
These actuators can compete with electrical and pneumatic systems.
University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
of a plant shift and turn toLday.eaves
ward the sunlight throughout the
Some manmade materials can
mimic this slow but steady reaction to
light energy, usually triggered by lasers
or focused ambient light. Researchers
discovered a way to speed up this effect
enough that its performance can compete against electrical and pneumatic
systems.
The team wanted to create machines
where light is the only source of energy
and direction. While some movement
and actuation were achieved with lightdriven polymers, it was too slow of a
response to be practical. When the poly-

mer sheet is flat, the light animates it
slowly, curving or curling over time. The
researchers found that by forming the
polymer into a curved shape like a shell,
the bending action happened much
more quickly and generated more
torque.
The researchers used a photoresponsive azobenzene-functionalized liquid
crystalline polymer (ALCP) film that is
50 micrometers thick and several millimeters in width and length. A shelllike geometry was created by confining
this material along its edges to create a
curve. Shining light on this geometry
folds the shell at a crease that sponta-

neously nucleates. This folding occurs
within tens of milliseconds and generates torque densities of up to 10 newton-meters per kilogram (10 Nm/kg).
The light-driven response is magnified
by about three orders of magnitude in
comparison to the material that was
flat.
This approach towards scaling up the
performance of light-driven polymers
could enable the design of fully untethered soft robots with numerous technological applications.
For more information, contact Maggie
Pavlick at maggiepavlick@pitt.edu; 412383-0449.
Motion Design, April 2021

Cov

ToC

https://www.nasa.gov/langley http://www.abpi.net/ntbpdfclicks/l.php?202104TBNAV

Tech Briefs Magazine - April 2021

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Tech Briefs Magazine - April 2021