Shane M. Farritor

Associate Professor

(402) 472-5805

E-mail: sfarritor2@unl.edu

Dr. Farritor joined the faculty of the Department of Mechanical Engineering in 1998. Prior to coming to UNL he worked in the Field and Space Robotics Laboratory at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the Unmanned Vehicle Lab at the C.S. Draper Laboratories. Dr. Farritor has studied at the Kennedy Space Center, Goddard Space Flight Center and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. He is a member of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) and the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) and serves on the AIAA Robotics Technical Committee.

Research Interests:

Robotic Highway Safety Markers

Objective: to develop robotic safety markers. The Robotic Safety Barrel (RSB) replaces the heavy base of a typical safety barrel with a mobile robot. A single lead robot (the general) provides global planning and control and issues commands to each barrel (the troops).

Miniature Surgical Robots

Objective: to develop miniature robots to be placed within the abdominal cavity to assist surgeons. These remotely controlled in vivo robots provide the surgeons with an enhanced field of view from arbitrary angles as well as provide dexterous manipulators not constrained by small incisions in the abdominal wall.

Real-Time Measurement of Track Stiffness

Objective: to develop a real-time, on-board, noncontact track modulus measurement system. The measurement system uses two railcars. A liquid tanker car houses the sensor system and acts as the loading vehicle. The second car, a renovated caboose, contains all controls and data acquisition equipment.

Planetary Cliff Descent Using Cooperative Robots

Objective: to study the coordination of three robots so they function as a team to explore the cliff face at inclines up to 70 degrees. Two robot assistants, or anchors, lower a third robot, called the rapeller, down the cliff using tethers. The anchors use actively controlled winches to first assist the rappeller in navigation about the cliff face and then retreat to safe ground.

For more information about Dr. Farritor's research, visit http://robots.unl.edu/.

Selected Publications: