APPLICATION OF SEMI-AUTONOMOUS ROBOTS IN NUCLEAR SECURITY

Rapid advances in robotic and continued reduction in cost while improvement in reliability of robots presents an opportunity to explore the use of robots to assist security workforce at nuclear facilities. Utilization of robots at could serve two functions - provide supplemental security blanket and reduce security cost. A collaborative research project team from Brookhaven National Laboratory and the UMass Lowell developed scenarios that uses the Boston Dynamics Spot robot. The sensors and protocols are integrated to demonstrate few different security applications using the robot at the UMass Lowell Research Reactor facility. The presentation will discuss the potential security enhancement and situational awareness that could be achieved using semi-autonomous robot operations. Situational awareness, in the context of facility security, refers to the ability to continuously perceive, understand, and predict the current and future states of the facility and its surroundings. This work examines the benefits of mobile versus static sensors, using two mobile platforms, and using established machine learning methods for perception.