Revolutionary engineering has led to extraordinary advances in robotics. As I’m writing this editorial, NASA scientists have just announced the discovery that Mars was once a wet planet. Their achievements in geological research could not have been possible without the impressive capabilities of the Opportunity and Spirit rovers. These robots were tasked—on an $820-million mission—with collecting data that NASA believed might indeed prove that liquid water existed on the red planet. The six-wheeled rovers have been able to traverse the landscape and perform critical research, yielding incredible results.

This is not to say that there haven’t been complications along the way. NASA scientists have grappled with malfunctions on both rovers. In late January, there were problems with the transmission feeds from Spirit. A month later, a malfunction that caused the on-board heater to stay on threatened to drain power from Opportunity. Despite these issues, the geologist robots have continued working successfully.

Here on Earth, we’re getting ready to see the latest and greatest fire fighting robots. The 2004 Trinity College Fire Fighting Home Robot Contest will be held in Hartford this month. The competition attracts everyone from curious onlookers to amateur hobbyists to highly skilled engineers. Challengers from around the world demonstrate the speed, dexterity, and efficiency of their small robots in extinguishing candle flames. We’ve definitely been impressed by some of the past entries. In fact, a few of the robots featured in our past issues debuted at the Trinity contest. Good luck to everyone in the competition!

The robots featured in this issue share many of the characteristics that have made the Mars rovers successful and will surely be demonstrated in the winners of the Trinity contest: efficiency, innovativeness, and accuracy. Like the scientists at NASA, when faced with obstacles, the engineers behind these projects met their design challenges with workable solutions.

In "Mini Rover 7," Joseph Miller discusses the electronic compassing scheme for his robot (p. 14). As he explains, precise navigation is a primary concern for most builders, which is why designing an effective heading system is so important. By calculating a more accurate bearing, Joseph was able to achieve better navigation capability.

Ingo Cyliax is back with an article about TeleBot, his robot surveillance unit (p. 30). The small, inexpensive robot is modeled after similar units used by municipalities to check for pipe damage in sewage systems. Ingo, too, used electronic compassing for his autonomous robot, which provides heading measurements with accuracy of ±2°.

Plus, we also have the scoop on Lego’s Spybot. Jay Francis has transformed this already interesting toy into a sophisticated autonomous robot by interfacing to the original electronics. Using a Microchip PIC16F876, he was able to emulate an I²C EEPROM. Those of you who enjoyed Jeff Bachiochi’s Mindstorms project in last year’s Robotics issue (Circuit Cellar, issue 153, April 2003) are sure to find Jay’s design interesting.

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