Design And Implementation Of A Bio-inspiresd Sampling Robot For Asteroid Microgravity Environment

Asteroid exploration is of great significance for studying the origin of life in solar system and the development of space resources.Sampling on the asteroids surface is one of the most direct and effective method for asteroid exploration.In order to overcome the microgravity environment on the asteroid surface,touch and go(TAG)landing sampling method is mainly used.To solve the two key problems of microgravity and unknown sample physical properties on the asteroids surface,this paper presents a mobile sampling scheme suitable for the microgravity environment based on the bionics principle,and designs a sampling robot for the microgravity environment of the asteroid.A bionic wheel-leg mobile robot with anchoring and crawling ability is designed by studying the physiological structure of cat’s claws.Then the flexible body mechanism and the leg-foot mechanism of the mobile robot are introduced,and the mechanical modeling and analysis of its moving and anchoring properties are carried out.And then,the dynamic simulation is carried out based on ADMAS.Taking pangolin as the bionic design prototype,the holing mechanism of pangolin is studied and analyzed,and the sweeping and grinding combined sampler is designed.The feasibility of the sampling scheme is evaluated by theoretical modeling,and then the influence of different parameters on the sampling performance is studied based on EDEM.At the same time,the flexible extension mechanism that controls the sampler to push down for sampling is introduced.Finally,the design of the sensing and control system of the bionic wheel-leg sampling robot is introduced.Then the prototype is prepared and the experimental test platform is built.The moving and anchoring performance of the mobile robot has been tested.Different sample simulants are selected for sampling experiment research.The changing trend of sampling mass,driving torque of brush wheel,and force between sampler and sample particles are analyzed under different parameters.The experimental results verify the feasibility of the mobile sampling scheme based on bionics.The wheel-leg anchoring scheme,sampling scheme combined sweeping and grinding in this paper can provide relevant technical basis for asteroids exploration in our country.