NASA dangles ONE MILLION DOLLARS for virtual Mars robots NASA has announced a million-dollar prize it will award to whomsoever can program a virtual robot to get stuff done ahead of a crewed mission to Mars. Contestants will work with is NASA's “Robonaut 5”, aka “Valkyrie”, an anthropomorphic robot that's already been used aboard the International Space Station. Those who enter the …
If the robot had an AI system that really was AI, all you'd have to do is to give it a copy of The Martian and the manuals for the tech sent to Mars.
Wow, ......
I am actually mortified at the stupidity of NASA ....
A million space-bucks... haha
to develop a functioning AI to carry out the next two tasks...
6.1.1 Task 1
The first task will require teams to find a series of lights on a panel. R5 will start standing in front of a textured panel that contains a number of colored lights. One at a time, the lights will turn on in a random pattern. Each light will remain on for fixed period of time, between 5 and 20 seconds. The light pattern starts once simulation is run, and will continue until simulation is complete.
Successful completion of Qualification Task 1 will entail:
1. Correctly identify ten lights in a row.
2. Light identification consists of an RGB value and position in R5’s head frame.
a. Both the RGB and position values are allowed an error tolerance that is TBD.
6.1.2 Task 2
The second task requires teams to press a button that opens a door, and then walk through the doorway. The button will be located on a wall and will be brightly colored and textured. R5 will start in front of the wall. The doorway will be located next to the button, and will open when the button is pushed.
Successful completion of the Qualification Task 2 will entail:
1. Pushing the button.
2. Walking through the doorway, where R5 must walk one (1) meter beyond the door without falling.
Ok answer to 6.1.1 .... code compiler directly attached to light panel that records every light on/off change and recording the time between state change... exports to encrypted text file and transmits to earth in real time ... repeats process 5 times sending information to different terminal at NASA .. terminals at NASA then verify by checking data is the same... appends all actions to log file in real time and transmits that at end of sequence .... error possibility minimal ... cost ... Cents... things that can go wrong .. negligible
6.1.2.1 .......... button ? forget it .... motion sensor .... door opens due to proximity of sensor
6.1.2.2........... technically impossible to answer without full technical specification of robot and full specification of structure ....
Reminds me of when NASA spent millions on developing a pen that would write anywhere .. underwater .. in space upside down .... the russions spent nothing and used a pencil ... hahaha
NASA spent millions on developing a pen
Actually NASA paid only $2.95 each for the original "Space Pens" they used (about $21 in 2016 dollars.)
Isn't this a slimmed down and easier challenge than the already existing DARPA one?
The only real difference is engineering the robot to work in a nearly airless environment at very low temperatures and that's already an in-house skill NASA has.
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