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Space missions benefit greatly by the capability of the on-board GNC system to adapt rapidly to unknown environment. Autonomous vision-based navigation is a particular technology under implementation in several ESA missions. One of the most interesting applications in that field is the proximity operations around a small asteroid, like those in HERA.
The goal of this activity was to develop a navigation algorithm with the capability to fly over an unknown terrain and achieve better navigation performances than current vision-based techniques based on unknown feature tracking.

Autonomous Surface Vessels (ASVs) are rapidly approaching market-readiness, with numerous partly-autonomous and teleoperated systems either under development or already performing operational demonstrations for applications such as bathymetric surveying (SEA-KIT Maxlimer, Deep BV), maintenance of offshore installations (Thales Halcyon), and commercial shipping (Yara Birkeland, Maersk VISTULA-Class).

The DAEDALUS mission concept aims to explore and characterise the entrance and initial part of lunar lava tubes within a compact, tightly integrated spherical robotic device, with a complementary payload set and autonomous capabilities. The mission concept specifically addresses the identification and characterisation of potential resources for future ESA exploration, the local environment of the Moon's subsurface and its geologic and compositional structure.

CRANE is a study commissioned through the OSIP lunar caves Campaign that examined the possiblity of using a crane to investigate lunar caves via lunar pits. The crane would be mounted on a rover that would need to be placed close to the pit.