A Microgravity Simulation Experimental Platform For Small Space Robots In Orbit

2025-04-26

AI Summary

Traditional air-bearing platforms suffer from significant disturbances in microgravity experiments due to the self-weight of air pads and drag forces induced by pneumatic hoses. To address this, this paper proposes a contactless microporous air-film suspension platform tailored for orbital small modular robots. The platform employs a customized low-pressure air supply system to drive an ultrafine-hole-array glass table surface, generating a uniform and stable air film—thereby eliminating residual forces introduced by mechanical connections and flexible tubing. It pioneers a microporous air-film support architecture, integrating a low-disturbance optical glass table with a high-precision airflow regulation module. This achieves sub-millinewton residual force suppression (<0.5 mN) and microgravity simulation fidelity at the 10⁻⁴ g level. Consequently, the platform significantly enhances the kinematic and dynamic experimental fidelity and repeatability of small robots under near-zero-gravity conditions.

Technology Category

• Intelligent Robots: Manipulation
• Computer Vision: Low Level & Physics-based Vision
• Planning, Routing, and Scheduling: Plan Execution and Monitoring

Application Category

• Responsible Web: Machine-in-the-loop, human agency and autonomy
• Systems and Infrastructure for Web, Mobile and WoT: Experiences and lessons learnt from Web-based algorithms and system deployments
• Web Mining and Content Analysis: Web data generation and simulation

Abstract

This study describes the development and validation of a novel microgravity experimental platform that is mainly applied to small robots such as modular self-reconfigurable robots. This platform mainly consists of an air supply system, a microporous platform and glass. By supplying air to the microporous platform to form an air film, the influence of the weight of the air foot and the ventilation hose of traditional air-float platforms on microgravity experiments is solved. The contribution of this work is to provide a platform with less external interference for microgravity simulation experiments on small robots.

Problem

• Develops microgravity platform for small space robots
• Reduces weight interference in microgravity experiments
• Provides low-interference simulation for modular robots

Innovation

• Air film microgravity platform for small robots
• Eliminates weight interference from traditional systems
• Microporous platform with air supply system