We dig robotic rovers, so robotic rovers able to traverse sub-zero Antarctic ice sheets while receiving power from the sun and wind are always enough to catch our eye. Carnegie Mellon tells us that their Nomad rover (which earlier trekked 135 miles through Chile’s Atacama Desert and across Antarctica) is being prepped to search for signs of living microorganisms on the surface of the ice. Outfitted with a wind turbine for the first time, the Nomad made it 6 miles through the snow and ice of the frozen Lake Mascoma while researchers studied the possibility of powering it both with solar and wind energy. Further development will include an ice coring and sampling device as well as a fluorescence spectrometer. (Thanks, James!)
Robot Deployed for Antartic Expedition [CarnegieMellon]
