The International Space Station may be home to six astronauts, but unbeknown to many is the fact that it also houses a huge range of robots.
Now, NASA has attached a ‘robot hotel’ to the side of the ISS to store its most critical robotic tools.
The ‘hotel’, called the Robotic Tool Stowage (RiTS), launched aboard the 19th SpaceX commercial resupply mission yesterday.
Its first residents will be two Robotic External Leak Locators (RELL), which can ‘sniff’ out the presence of gases such as ammonia to detect leaks on the ISS.
Mark Neuman, RiTS hardware manager, said: “For each of its stored tools, RiTS will provide heat and physical protection from radiation and micrometeroids, or tiny, high-speed objects hurtling through space.
“Its thermal system maintains ideal temperatures for the instruments, helping them stay functional.”
NASA doesn’t keep the robots inside the station for two key reasons.
Firstly, they take up space that could be used for other scientific hardware, and secondly, the process of deploying the robots takes much longer when they’re not stored externally.
Chris Craw, NASA Senior Systems Integration Lead, explained: “This hardware will significantly reduce time and cost for the station crew to deploy leak detection capabilities.
“With RiTS, we’ll have easier and faster access to RELL, which can help ensure our astronauts’ safety in space.”
