Journal of Geo-information Science >
A Three-Dimensional Lunar Rover Simulation Method for Safety Assessment of Lunar Surface Routes
Received date: 2024-07-14
Revised date: 2024-08-19
Online published: 2025-03-25
Supported by
National Natural Science Foundation of China(42371422)
National Natural Science Foundation of China(42221002)
[Objectives] Rovers play an essential role in lunar exploration, serving as vital tools for scientists aiming to unravel the Moon's geological history and exploit its potential water-ice reserves. However, navigating the lunar surface with rovers presents significant safety risks due to the complex and often hazardous terrain, compounded by the lack of a consistent and reliable light source. The absence of pre-existing, high-resolution data—such as LiDAR—prior to exploration missions poses a considerable challenge in evaluating the safety of potential rover paths. Given these constraints, developing a reliable pre-assessment method is crucial for enhancing the success rate of lunar rover missions. [Methods] This paper introduces a 3D simulation method for lunar rover exploration, leveraging the Visualization Toolkit (VTK) to address these challenges. Our method integrates three critical aspects. Firstly, it offers high-resolution visualization of the lunar surface terrain, capturing intricate details down to the meter scale. Secondly, it simulates the dynamic illumination environment on the lunar surface, accounting for the varying illumination conditions due to the Moon 's rotation and orbital position. Thirdly, it models the rover's position and attitude transformations as it navigates the terrain. [Results] The effectiveness of this simulation approach is demonstrated through a case study focusing on the Shackleton Connecting Ridge region at the lunar South Pole, an area of significant interest due to its challenging topography and potential for water-ice deposits. The 3D simulation accurately depicts the undulating terrain of impact craters and allows for a thorough assessment of the rover's route safety by visualizing the potential hazards along the path. Moreover, the simulation offers an intuitive representation of the rover's movement, including real-time adjustments in position and attitude, which are critical for ensuring the rover’s stability and operational safety over long distances. Additionally, our method includes a real-time update feature for the dynamic illumination scene, enabling direct observation of how changing light conditions affect the rover's path during the mission. This capability is particularly important for assessing the feasibility of navigating through areas that may experience prolonged periods of darkness or extreme shadowing, which could impede the rover's progress or jeopardize its safety. The goal of this research is to improve the reliability and safety of future lunar rover missions by providing a robust pre-assessment tool that can verify the feasibility of proposed exploration routes. [Conclusions] This method thus offers crucial a priori information, serving as an essential guarantee for the successful execution of future lunar exploration endeavors.
LI Pengshuo , FENG Yongjiu , TONG Xiaohua , XI Mengrong , XU Xiong , LIU Shijie , HUANG Qian . A Three-Dimensional Lunar Rover Simulation Method for Safety Assessment of Lunar Surface Routes[J]. Journal of Geo-information Science, 2025 , 27(4) : 864 -875 . DOI: 10.12082/dqxxkx.2025.240401
表1 本研究使用的栅格数据集Tab. 1 The raster datasets used in this study |
表2 巡视器移动安全评估指标Tab. 2 The indicators for evaluating the mobile safety of rovers |
安全指标 | 平均值 | 最大值 | 最小值 | 移动风险评估结果 |
---|---|---|---|---|
俯仰角变化量/° | 0.407 | 5.493 | 0 | 低风险 |
横滚角变化量/° | 0.290 | 3.930 | 0 | 低风险 |
航向角变化量/° | 0.124 | 46.037 | 0 | 低风险 |
地形坡度/° | 7.341 | 15.092 | 0.213 | 中等风险 |
太阳光照 | 0.492 | 0.980 | 0.264 | 低风险 |
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