The nearly two-month trial has fine-tuned the Chinese made roaming robot to pass a 30-kilometer autonomous walking test on Antarctic ice sheets, the first of its kind made by a Chinese robot.
The robot, weighing half a ton, can be operating under an extreme temperature as low as -40 °C. The robot in orange color looks more like an off-road jeep, with a body being designed with a suspension chassis, also like an off-road car. Its four wheels are replaced by triangular caterpillars to enhance its walking capability on ice and snow. It comes with an automated driving system, capable of ice and snow terrain identification and assessment, GPS navigation, and autopiloting.
researchers have made a range of tests to see the performance of robot’s moving mechanisms, ice probing radar, and long-distance autonomous walk from last December 9 to this February 5, on ice-covered areas near the Zhongshan Station and the inland staging area. The robot is designed to conduct an autonomous scientific investigation over an area of about 60,000 square kilometers across the Amery ice shelf. In this context, the 30-km autonomous walking made this time only makes a beginning.