Cynthia Vaskis
SLM521 Spring
2004
Web Quest Assignment – Part
1
File: webquep1.htm
Web Quest Part 1 –
Meet the Mars Rovers named Spirit and Opportunity
Diagrammed picture of the Mars rover (see site
for clearer picture)
Introduction to Part 1 - The student will learn about the Mars Mission and
the two identical robotic rovers named Spirit and
Process Part 1 – Individual Research and Small Group
Discussion – After the student has
had some time to look at the web sites below (half an hour or more), they will answer the questions below by
holding small group discussions to have the students help each other understand
how the rover works based upon what they gathered from the web
information. Then they will individually
draw a sketch of the rover and label its main parts and equipment from the
information they have learned.
1. Are there any design differences between the two rovers, Spirit and
2. Name
the major parts of the rover that are used for the following functions: to
hold everything together, to move, to get energy, to store energy, to see, to
touch or handle things, to communicate with Earth Mission Control directly, to
communicate with orbiting satellites, and to keep warm. What are the robotic parts of the two active
Martian rovers? How do these robots
collect samples or perform experiments?
What type of power is used to run the robots and what is their energy
source? The student might want to review
an example of how to draw your robot design (for Part 5) as in Dropin#5
under origin
labeling process and the example
drawing of an object with some labels.
The student should make a simple
sketch of the Mars rover and identify the parts. They can use the graph paper
web site provided on-line (and print it out), your own graph paper, or a
drawing tool on the computer and use a table function with many rows and
columns to create graph paper.
3. If the student has seen the previous Dropin#1
and Dropin#2
lessons or studied different coordinate systems, the student should discuss
what types of coordinate systems they think are used on the rovers and for
which parts. Sometimes a Cartesian
coordinate system locates appendages on the main part of the vehicle but
another coordinate system, such as a Polar coordinate system, may be used to
rotate any appendages (arms, heads).
4. How
does the rover move across the terrain safely? Watch the video to find the answers. (NOTE:
teachers must download the video prior to the lesson time which may take a half
an hour or more). A summary of the
audio from the video is provided here in case the video cannot be
downloaded. What parts of the rover are
used to figure out how to move across the terrain and what is the sequence of
tasks it must do before it moves forward on the terrain? What math or comparison functions does the
rover do in its computer to see how to move across the land? How does the rover know what the land is like
in front of it and how is that data stored?
5. Look at the diagrams of the robotic arm and identify the three main
pieces of equipment on the robotic arm to perform experiments. Describe briefly how each one works and how
they are used to collect and test rock samples.
6. There is no perfect robot. What have been some of the problems that the
rovers have had working on Mars? Name one problem for each rover that it has
had so far. If you can, describe how
it was fixed, why it was not fixed, or how Mission Control worked around it.
7. Where
are the two rovers located now? They
landed on opposite sides of Mars. Can
you guess why NASA did that? The
8. What
type of data has been received from the Mars mission and what have scientists
have learned? Find three interesting scientific facts that the rovers have been able
to obtain for scientists here on earth.
This could be as simple as noting the different types of rocks that have
been found or whether they think water could have been there before. Then they will share their facts with the
class after everyone has completed this Part 1.
The student could discuss and identify some geological features that the
rovers have seen on the ground or from the satellites orbiting the planet or
some fact the scientists learned during the process of landing, getting the
rover out of its landing apparatus, while the rover moved around or performed
its experiments.
First review these web sites to obtain the
information and then answer the questions above in a small group discussion.
Mars
Exploration Rover Mission The Mission – Rover Photograph with annotations
to see where everything is on the rover (Picture above found at this web site)
http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/spacecraft_surface_rover.html
Martian
explorer's toolkit - Robotic arm and hand with tools description
KTLA.com
LA's WB Television
Los Angeles - Martian explorer's toolkit
http://ktla.trb.com/news/local/la-011504marseyes-g,0,7178958.graphic?coll=ktla-feedroom-utility
http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/spacecraft_surface_instru.html
http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/
Mars Exploration Rover Kit – Show Mars rover
tool kits you can buy.
http://mars-rover.com
Take a tour of Mars as seen from one of the rovers.
Mars Quest – Take a tour of the
rovers on Mars and see what they see.
Learn about the mission on Mars happening right now.
http://www.marsquestonline.org/mer/
Rover Web sites
http://www.solarviews.com/eng/mars.htm
Mars Robots, Mars Rover,
Mars Pathfinder
http://www.robotbooks.com/mars_robot_robots.htm
http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/gallery/atlas/valles-marineris.html
Mars Team Online –
An abridges/Guided Tour
http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/mars/tourguide/start.html
http://ranier.hq.nasa.gov/telerobotics_page/realrobots.html
From
Robot Geologists to Human Geologists on Mars
http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/spotlight/spirit/a8_20040113.html
http://www.unixreview.com/documents/s=8989/ur0403j/
The Rover Descriptions
Rock on! Twin rovers, set to roll over Mars
http://www.findarticles.com/cf_dls/m0EPF/17_103/112860108/p1/article.jhtml
http://www.mit.edu:8001/courses/6.033/handouts/dp2/dp2.html
NSSDC
Master Catalog Spacecraft - Spirit
http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/database/MasterCatalog?sc=2003-027A
NSSDC
Master Catalog Spacecraft - Opportunity
http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/database/MasterCatalog?sc=2003-032A
Mars
Can You Hear Me Now
Mars Astrobiology Magazine
Search for Life on Mars
http://mars.astrobio.net/news/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=350&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0
Mars Exploration
Rover Mission Press Release Images Spirit
http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/gallery/press/spirit/
Mars Rover Finds
Rock Resembling Meteorites That Fell to Earth
http://www.spacedaily.com/news/mars-mers-04zzzw.html
See the top level NASA page
for the rovers at http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/ and look under [all videos] and Opportunity
and then Autonomous Navigation (traversing the Martian landscape) for a neat video on the rover moving across
the Martian landscape. It explains how the
rover figures out a pathway before moving along it. (NOTE: The teacher may need to download this
ahead of time.)
Space Exploration with Robotics Information
Educator’ Guide to
Robotics Spacecraft – Robots: Like Us! – Read the author’s view about how
robots and humans are similar and different.
http://www.solarviews.com/eng/edu/robotsc.htm
NASA Mars Exploration Real Time Images - Look at some
Martian Pictures
Pictures of the Mars Mission
from the three orbiting satellites taken of the Martian surface as well as
images the rovers have taken are available to download and save into your
computer’s Picture Folder. Get to your
Picture Folder by clicking on the small picture icon at the bottom of a Word
edit file. Then click on the image you
want and select Insert and Link. You can
select one of the images from the Mars Rover photo gallery to download into
your Pictures Folder or to set as your desktop background on your computer
screen. The image of
Mars Exploration
Rover Mission: Multimedia – You can view the images from the cameras on the
two robotic machines on Mars called Rover and
http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/gallery/images.html
Additional Mars rover data
http://www.transterrestrial.com/archives/003370.html
Mars
Exploration Rover Martian Soil
http://www.martiansoil.com/archives/cat_mars_exploration_rover.php
Turning
robots into a well-oiled machine
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-04/nsf-tri041204.php