Autonomous Urban Reconnaissance Ingress System (AURIS)

The Autonomous Urban Reconnaissance Ingress System (AURIS) addresses a significant limitation of current military robotics technology: the inability of reconnaissance robots to open doors. It can perform with or without using explosive charges, can operate quickly to allow rapid ingress, has the versatility to be used for difficult to open doors, and has proven its feasibility with semi-autonomous control in PH I while providing a feasible path for fully autonomous interior building reconnaissance based on an innovative combination of proven and new technology. It allows the use of many different robotic platforms and is designed to be easily implemented on standard military platforms (PH I saw its implementation onto a Talon and a PackBot). AURIS enables advanced interior building reconnaissance with platform independence and removes the disadvantages of current operator-intensive systems based on operator manual or visual-servoing control. Based on the success of AURIS in Phase I, Phase II concentrates on the most challenging aspects of the unmanned door-opening task while providing high probability for smooth transition and commercialization. Additionally, the system aligns itself to successfully perform other complex tasks in the short term.