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The Cornell Mars Rover project team (CMR) designs an innovative Mars rover to compete in the University Rover Challenge. We are an interdisciplinary student-run team that brings together talented minds from engineering, science, and business. Together, we foster creative and intellectual growth through the development of our competitive design. Our team has 45 undergraduate members from over 10 different majors while competing 6 straight years with 6 different rovers designed, built, and manufactured by our members
January 2017 CMR Team Photo
About The University Rover Challenge
The University Rover Challenge is an international competition that pushes students beyond the theoretical knowledge they gain in classes, encouraging innovation and creation of new rovers to aid in future explorations of the neighboring planet. Each team must design, build, and operate a rover to compete against those of contending universities in a variety of field tasks that an actual Mars rover will face on future missions to the Red Planet. Our rover must navigate rugged terrain, enduring 1m cliff drops, climbing slopes in excess of 60 degrees, and traversing over rock and boulder fields. We must build a robotic arm that will perform a variety of precise operations, such as manipulating buttons, knobs, and levers on a control panel. Additionally, we retrieve soil samples with a drill, and perform on board soil analysis with pH sensors, humidity sensors, and spectrometers. Finally, new this year we have to navigate autonomously across the Utah desert, avoiding obstacles, recognizing tennis balls from the desert, and determining when the rover is within a specified distance from the target. This year the competition saw 82 teams register from 13 different nations, our team was one of 36 to advance past the competition's critical design review and will be competing this year at the Mars Desert Research Station in Hanksville, Utah from June 1-3.
Chronos taking a break during URC 2016
We need you!
Cornell Mars Rover needs your support! We're looking to use our crowdfunding money to push the boundaries of technology on our rover. We plan on purchasing a new stereo camera to improve our autonomous systems and better analyze our surroundings. We would also use the money to purchase the components needed to build a setup that could test our wheels, treads, and suspensions over a variety of terrains. Your support will also help us purchase a new digital camera or two to help our rover see at competition, tools for our lab space, stock for next year, and a new rev of PCB's for our electrical team. Your support means a lot to us and will allow us to continue our work and construct the most advanced rover we can.
URC 2016 Competition Team Photo
Stay Connected!
Be sure to check out our website (https://marsrover.engineering.cornell.edu/), like us on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/cornellmarsrover/) and follow us on Twitter (@CMRTeam)!
Every bit matters, you're helping us stock our lab with tools we need to succeed! Thank you so much!!
We will send you a personalized thank you note signed by our team honoring your generous donation!
You helped us buy a new webcam for our rover. As thanks we will send you a CMR sticker and a personalized thank you letter signed by the team!
A video shoutout from our team lead and a pun from John plus a personalized thank you note signed by the team!
You just helped us buy a new stereo camera! As a thank you you'll get a video shout out from the entire team and a pun from John, plus a personalized thank you note signed by the team!
You enabled us to purchase a new test setup for our wheels and suspension system! As a thank you you'll receive a personalized laser cut plaque acknowledging your contribution
Thank you so much for the generous contribution! We will send you a 3D printed mini-rover and send a signed thank you note from the team!