Mars Rover Team Takes Third at International Competition
A Northeastern University student team was a finalist in the University Rover Challenge of The Mars Society, where they placed in the top three at the competition. They competed in Utah with 39 teams from around the world against schools like the University of Michigan, Cornell, as well as teams from Japan, Bangladesh, Turkey, and more.
Over the past year, Northeastern’s Mars Rover Team—part of Students for the Exploration and Development of Space (SEDS)—has developed a complex rover capable of navigating rough terrain autonomously, detecting life using an onboard science payload, and manipulating objects such as switches, buttons, and drawers. The team was a finalist in the University Rover Challenge of The Mars Society, where they placed in the top three against 38 other teams.
 The team has built two rovers: one is used during competition and the second as a development testbed. |
 The Northeastern Mars Rover team secured its first podium finish at this year’s University Rover Challenge. |
The rover is equipped with a brushless motor drivetrain, 15 cameras, four wireless communication bands, a custom six DOF arm, a newly designed functional autonomous navigation system, hotswap battery architecture now at 24V, and a robust life detection system with a custom-designed PCB for UV-vis spectroscopy.
Team members have fun testing in the backyard together.
As in previous years, the team has collaborated with NUAV, Northeastern’s UAV project group from the AerospaceNU club. The drone sports a lighter and wider frame capable of 19 minutes of flight time with a 1kg payload. Featuring parallel video and remote control links along with automatic GPS navigation, the drone acts as a scout and provides a steady overhead view in one of the missions.
URC is the world’s premier robotics competition for college students. Held annually in the desert of southern Utah in the United States, URC challenges student teams to design and build the next generation of Mars rovers that will one day work alongside astronauts exploring the Red Planet. The Mars Society is the world’s largest and most influential space advocacy organization dedicated to the human exploration and settlement of the planet Mars.
 Bryan Holsinger, Sakib Azgar, Jiajia Fu, Ronan Gleason, Matt Geisel, Dylan Wolter, Spandana Machavarapu, Andrei Oprea, Brendan Manning, and Varun Dhar pose for a selfie after the Delivery challenge. |
 Operators Noah Büttner, Megan Farrington, Sam Damonti, and Luke Taylor maneuver the rover for the Equipment Servicing challenge. |
Khoury students Rishabh Kumar, Richard Zhao, Nico Rising, and Adharsh Kandula pose with an orange mallet and ArUco tag that were components in the Autonomous challenge for this year.
Related Story: Resilient design and smart systems drive Northeastern’s Mars rover to podium finish