AIKEN, S.C. – For some students pursuing graduate degrees in robotics, the final exam could involve helping EM solve some of its toughest problems.
July 28, 2016
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SRNL developed this robot to inspect the H-Canyon air tunnel at SRS.
This robot developed by SRNL operates in the H-Canyon air tunnel.
A robot developed by SRNL conducts radiological surveys.
AIKEN, S.C. – For some students pursuing graduate degrees in robotics, the final exam could involve helping EM solve some of its toughest problems.
Under a new EM-funded Robotics Traineeship Program, Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) will work with Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL) to design the curriculum for five graduate students each year and help apply their research toward real-world EM needs.
As early as this fall, the selected students could begin deploying robotic solutions — first in mockups and then in actual facilities — at SRNL and the Savannah River Site. Based at CMU in Pittsburgh, the two-year program will partner with DOE’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in Washington state.
“Our whole intent here is to develop robotics expertise that can help DOE with their future cleanup mission and also reduce risk to the nuclear facility worker,” said Luke Reid, SRNL manager of mechanical systems and custom equipment development. “The challenges that DOE faces cannot be met without remote capability in many cases. CMU is one of the premier robotics universities in the country and it’s a tremendous opportunity to collaborate with students and faculty of this caliber. This partnership aligns very well with SRNL’s Advanced Manufacturing Collaborative initiative, which includes advanced robotics as one of its focus areas.”
The students will collaborate with SRNL to establish a research program that addresses real problems.
Potential areas of study include glove box and hot cell robotics, autonomous robotics in difficult-to-navigate environments, and automated or mobile systems to collect samples and data for nuclear assessment and deactivation and decommissioning.
SRNL has a long history in robotics for use in environmental management and high-hazard conditions. The laboratory recently deployed robots to successfully inspect the H-Canyon air exhaust tunnel, which could provide a scenario for testing the robotic systems being developed by the CMU students.
“We will be starting out in a simulated environment, but then taking it to a real radiological and hazardous environment for testing is our intent for each of these students and their robotic systems,” said SRNL researcher Eric Kriikku.