Hello LV Robotics community!

Well, looks like we’re going to the moon again, this time with robots. NASA is sending three autonomous mobile robots to the moon where they’ll have to work as a team under challenging conditions. NASA is gearing up to not only return people to the moon, but establish a long-term presence there, the time seems ripe to see just how helpful autonomous mobile robots could be on the moon’s surface.

So, how does NASA plan to achieve this? For our next event we will hopefully answer this question with the help of Michael Laine, founder of LiftPort. LiftPort Group was founded on the idea that an Elevator to Space could – and should – be built commercially.

Believe me, this sounds crazy but it’s not. The concept of space elevators has been around for decades with an early versions tested by various government labs. Why space elevators? The primary aim is to significantly reduce the cost of moving people and equipment to orbit, potentially making space travel routine.

An Earth-based space elevator would consist of a cable with one end attached to the surface near the equator and the other end attached to a counterweight in space beyond geostationary orbit (35,786 km altitude). The competing forces of gravity, which is stronger at the lower end, and the upward centrifugal pseudo-force (it is actually the inertia of the counterweight that creates the tension on the space side), which is stronger at the upper end, would result in the cable being held up, under tension, and stationary over a single position on Earth.

So join us for our next meetup to discuss space elevators and the potential for robots on the moon using a space elevator for transportation. And yes, there are plans to build a community of over 1000 people on the moon so they will need space elevators and robots to accomplish the mission.

Also– special guest speaker Tommy Laplante. Tommy supplies robots to Station Casinos, Caesars, MGM, Wynn and others. Tommy knows the ins and outs of the Las Vegas strip and what hoteliers are looking for– and how many robots are currently deployed in field. Tommy is the former CIO of Top Golf, Director of IT for Harrah’s Entertainment and Caesars Casino. He helped launch cleaning robots on the strip and now operates Star Support, a robot distribution and service company. I just visited Tommy’s offices where he was help HYTRON show their bathroom cleaning robots to a group of casino executives who showed strong interest in the robot.

Whether you have plans for space or terrestrial deployments you do not want to miss this event. Both Tommy and Michael have a lot of stories to tell and key insights to share.

We are holding the next event at Pololu (thank you Jan!) so get your popcorn ready, this is going to be interesting.

Look forward to seeing everyone.

Robot regards,
Bob & Darius
LV Robotics