Issue link: https://htpgraphics.uberflip.com/i/1214361
DEMONSTRATIONS AND DEPLOYMENTS A key indicator of our success is the number of demonstrations and deployments we complete. Many of our institutions have facilities at which they regularly demonstrate their technology, including: • The University of Manchester's Robotics for Extreme Environments Laboratory (REEL), in Cumbria. • The University of Bristol's Fenswood Farm facility, close to Bristol. • The University of Nottingham's Rolls-Royce University Technology Centre in Manufacturing Technology. • RACE, Oxfordshire, has extensive demonstration facilities including NIST lanes. The terrain course, consisting of three 'lanes', was first developed by NIST, the U.S's National Institute of Standards and Technology. The lanes provide a standard benchmark for all small/medium wheeled, tracked and legged robots. In addition to demonstrations of individual pieces of technology, in 2019 we hosted two demonstration days in which we collated a range of the technology that we are developing and invited industry to see this and give feedback. KEY DEPLOYMENTS • CARMA platform on site at Sellafield. • UAV surveys of Chernobyl and Fukushima. CROSS – SECTOR WORK In addition to demonstrations and deployments specific to the nuclear industry, our research is also relevant to other sectors. Supporting collaborations with researchers working in other extreme environments allows us to develop and share knowledge, and test our skills somewhere unknown. Our platforms have been to a Fire Service College as well as in solar farms, caves, canals and California. Dr Jon Gammell, from the Oxford Robotics Institute, has been working with Dr. Issa Nesnas and Dr. Michael Paton (and others) of the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) Robotic Surface Mobility Group. Together, they tested novel motion planning algorithms for autonomous robotics at a field test in the Mojave Desert (California). The planning algorithms developed by Jon were tested on Axel, a tethered rover concept designed for exploration and analysis of near-vertical surfaces. This application poses a number of path-planning challenges that are representative of the problems seen across autonomous domains. Jon's work successfully achieved 95% autonomy on these trials. Researchers from Manchester work closely with the HOME offshore project, which develops technology for offshore asset inspection. The HOME project held a demonstration event in Salford Quays, Manchester. They chose Salford Quays as they could float a model wind turbine for a live, remote inspection using both a UAV and aquatic inspection platform. The demonstration put on by the team from Manchester gave a glimpse of how wind turbines could be inspected and maintained in the future. 25