Scaling the Power of the Astronaut via Workload-aware Robotic Apprenticeship and Explainable Autonomy

Advances in robotic technology have opened up an era of tremendous scientific discovery in planetary science within our solar system. While NASA has successfully landed multiple rovers on Mars, these robots require a human operators to monitor the rover’s status, analyze sensor data, and command or even directly teleoperate the robot under significant time delay. To harness the full potential of these robotic systems and enable true human-robot teaming, we propose to develop new computational methods for robots to better intuit the goals and strategies of their human counterparts and to understand when and how to act with more autonomy

This project aims to unlock latent scientific yield of rbotic platforms in deep space by enabling machines to understand human goals and act with some autonomy. Additionally, this project will increase robot autonomy in some areas of decision-making can free up astronauts to focus on mission-level objectives, scientific inquiry, and monitoring safety-critical systems and develop novel workload metrics that infer workload through observation rather than intrusive monitoring

This is early/mid-stage (TRL 3) — the most realistic path in is NASA SBIR/STTR, which funds small businesses and research institutions to develop technology aligned with NASA's needs (equity-free, phased funding). Check whether a current SBIR/STTR solicitation topic overlaps with this project's technology area, or contact the project directly (above) to ask.

None of these are guaranteed paths for this specific project — TechPort itself doesn't have an "apply" button. Reaching out to the contact(s) above with a specific question is usually the fastest way to find out what's actually open.