Indiana Jones would not have to come face-to-face with quite so many snakes if he'd been around today. Instead, he could have borrowed a robot from his local science lab and gone searching for the holy grail, without even having to use his whip.
Around the globe, many robot explorers are being developed to explore the deepest seafloor and the darkest cave, with the hope that one day they can be used to look for rare minerals and signs of life on other planets.
There are also many companies who have produced robots that can do tasks that are dangerous for us humans, such as studying miles of underwater pipes looking for leaks. Robots are also much better at withstanding the harshest of environments, and won't ever complain about being too cold.
From agile robot dogs to large submersibles, we take a look through some of the many robot explorers that could one day boldly go where no human really wants to.Here are some of our favourite robot explorers:
Climbing robot - NASA
LEMUR 3 is a free climbing robot being built at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and is able to crawl, walk and even climb rock walls. This robot was designed to operate in extreme terrains, demonstrating the applicability of its systems for possible missions to Mars and the Moon. Photo by NASA/JPL
Frozen lake explorer - NASA
Photo By NASA/JPLBRUIE (Buoyant Rover for Under-Ice Exploration) is an underwater rover prototype being developed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. The rover began testing in the Arctic in 2015 and it is designed to explore the interior ocean of water worlds in the Solar System, such as the underground oceans of Jupiter’s moon Europa or Saturn’s moon Enceladus. Photo by NASA/JPL
Cave diver - UNEXIMIN
Photo by Balazs Mohai/EPA-EFE/ShutterstockThe UX-1A diver robot is pictured during a field test in Molnar Janos Cave in Budapest, Hungary, 3 July 2019. The device was developed for underwater exploration in flooded mines by an international team led by the University of Miskolc as part of the EU-funded UNEXIMIN (Underwater Explorer for flooded Mines) Horizon 2020 project. The submerging robot collects geological data from water-filled cavities, and will be deployed in search operations for cave and mine accidents.Photo by Balazs Mohai/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock
Terrain explorer - NASA
Photo by NASA/JPLThis four-legged explorer prototype combines autonomy "smarts" provided by JPL with a doglike walker called NeBula-SPOT, built by Boston Dynamics. Subterranean Spot was developed in response to the Subterranean Challenge, a contest sponsored by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). NeBula SPOTwas designed to demonstrate the autonomy needed to navigate extreme environments without human guidance or access to GPS, and could be used to explore caves or potentially other planetary surfaces.Photo by NASA/JPL
The autonomous uncrewed deep-sea submersible Vityaz-D is seen in the port of Vladivostok on Russia's Pacific coast. Vityaz-D is the world's first uncrewed submersible to descend into the Mariana Trench in the Pacific Ocean. The submersible reached the bottom of the Mariana Trench on 8 May 2020. Designed by the St Petersburg-based design bureau TsKB Rubin, Vityaz-D can dive to a depth of up to 12km and overcome obstacles and find its way out of caves and trenches using artificial intelligence. Photo by Yuri Smityuk/TASS/Getty Images
Cave explorer - NASA
Photo by NASA/JPLNASA's robotics team drives the test rover, CaveR, into Valentine Cave at Lava Beds National Monument, California, USA. The science instruments, visible in the box-like structure pointing to one wall of the cave, will begin testing further downstream in the cave. One of the CaveR engineers is perched on a lava ledge, a marker of one of the lava flows in the cave. Photo by NASA/JPL
Autonomous diver - Houston Mechatronics
The Aquanaut is anuncrewed underwater vehicle capable of carrying out complex tasks. It has been designed for commercial use to inspect subsea oil and gas pipes, and is capable of using tools. This means that these tasks can be done remotely, without putting human life in danger. It is pictured here undergoing testing at NASA's Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory in Houston, Texas, USA. Photo by Ken Kiefer
Flying cave drone - NASA
Rollocopter is a hybrid aerial and terrestrial drone that uses a four-rotor system to fly or roll along on two passive wheels. This design, being developed by NASA's Costar team, gives the robot a large range and eliminates obstacle-avoidance issues associated with ground-only robots. When Rollocopter encounters an obstacle, it can simply fly over it. To fly, this robot requires a celestial body with an atmosphere and could be used to explore subterranean caves other worlds. Photo by NASA/JPL
James Cutmore is the picture editor of BBC Science Focus Magazine. He has worked on the magazine and website for over a decade, telling compelling science stories through the use of striking imagery. He holds a degree in Fine Art, and has been nominated for the British Society of Magazine Editors Talent Awards, being highly commended in 2020. His main areas of interest include photography that highlights positive technology and the natural world. For many years he was a judge for the Wellcome Trust's image competition, as well as judging for the Royal Photographic Society.
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