LaserNav – LiDAR-Based Dark Navigation for Safe and Precise Lunar Landing

Astrobotic proposes an integrated LiDAR-based dark navigation sensor system capable of generating pose estimates over unilluminated lunar terrain to increase the hazard detection and avoidance (HDA) capabilities of future lunar lander missions, including NASA CLPS missions and the Artemis program. This sensor, Astrobotic's LaserNav, will feature dark navigation software enabling robust and accurate poste estimation at landing and flight-qualified and radiation-tested high-performance compute dedicated to processing intensive GNC descent and landing sensor data and running dark navigation algorithms. LaserNav will leverage Astrobotic's current hazard detection LiDAR, which outputs point cloud data for HDA. During this proposed effort the hardware and software components of LaserNav will be developed, tested, integrated as a sensor suite to an Astrobotic lander, and demonstrate illumination-independent LiDAR-based hazard detection on Astrobotic's next lunar mission. Astrobotic's target market for LaserNav is primarily the space planetary landing market, with the suborbital rocket market as a secondary adjacency. As a more capable, flexible, and affordable alternative to existing TRN solutions, LaserNav will enable lander integrators to cost-effectively achieve greater mission assurance.

The LaserNav project will advance Astrobotic’s descent and landing sensor system and software to ward an optimized and flexible commercial product for use across a wide range of future missions, spacecraft, and space applications. There is no multi-mode LiDAR navigation system like LaserNav on the commercial market or being used by current small landers. The NASA SPLICE (Safe and Precise Landing-Integrated Capabilities Evolution) team and GNC engineers at JSC are actively developing and validating software and sensors for active LiDAR TRN and no-light lunar landing technologies. This is an active research area in the entry/de-orbit, descent, and landing (EDL/DDL) community as is evidenced by multiple NASA’s Civil Space Shortfalls. Multiple NASA lunar surface missions are planned for the near term that could benefit from this unique LiDAR-based sensor system to increase likelihood of successful soft landing, including eight scheduled and contracted CLPS missions, two CLPS missions that will be competed and awarded within the next calendar year (CS-6 and CT-4), and three anticipated Artemis Human Landing System (HLS) program landings. Many additional NASA lunar surface missions are also likely to be scheduled to support current missions or as follow-ons. The Agency has also already started planning for near-future missions to Mars, small airless bodies, and icy moons. Astrobotic anticipates there will be many DoD opportunities for LaserNav's robust, low SWaP RPOD and other real time LiDAR perception and navigation operation capabilities. These include applications such as on-orbit assembly and manufacturing, robotic satellite servicing and inspection, and hazard detection for point-to-point vertical takeoff, vertical landing (VTVL) terrestrial rockets. LaserNav’s high-performance space computer and hardware-accelerated algorithms are aligned to demanding in-space processing applications for perception and navigation, including space situational awareness (SSA) and onboard AI and machine learning use cases.

This is a mature technology (TRL 7+) — the realistic path in is usually NASA's Technology Transfer Program: licensing an existing NASA patent, or a Space Act Agreement to use NASA facilities/expertise directly. NASA also runs a startup licensing program with no upfront fee for companies formed to commercialize a specific NASA technology.

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.