Robotic Thin Section Sample Preparation Device for In Situ Planetary Exploration

Details Robotic Thin Section Sample Preparation Device for In Situ Planetary Exploration Robotic Thin Section Sample Preparation Device for In Situ Planetary Exploration

Dec 2008

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2008agufm.p53c1463d&link_type=abstract

American Geophysical Union, Fall Meeting 2008, abstract #P53C-1463

Computer Science

Robotics

3694 Instruments And Techniques, 5194 Instruments And Techniques

Scientific paper

Petrographic thin sections are used on Earth to identify minerals. The data from thin sections together with chemical rock data could result in a much better interpretation of planetary geology. A petrographic thin section is a well polished thin (~30 micron) sample of rock mounted on a glass slide. When viewed under a polarizing microscope one can quickly observe minerals from the interference colors. With unpolarized light some textural and structural features can be identified. Making of thin section is an art that takes many years of experience to acquire. All thin sections on Earth have been done manually. The Colorado School of Mines and Honeybee Robotics have been developing a robotic thin section device that one day may be used on planetary surface missions to autonomously slice, grind and polish a piece of rock. In particular, we have been developing methods for rough cutting, epoxy/slide application, and grinding/polishing of a rock to thin section quality. Examination of rock surface finish was done quantitatively using surface roughness measurement and qualitatively by a thin section expert. Here we report on the progress to date.

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