NASA astronaut Steve Swanson, left, signs autographs during the TouchTomorrow Festival, held in conjunction with the 2015 Sample Return Robot Challenge, Saturday, June 13, 2015 at the Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) in Worcester, Mass. Sixteen teams competed for a $ million NASA prize purse. Teams will be required to demonstrate autonomous robots that can locate and collect samples from a wide and varied terrain, operating without human control. The objective of this NASA-WPI Centennial Challenge is to encourage innovations in autonomous navigation and robotics technologies. Innovati

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NASA astronaut Steve Swanson, left, signs autographs during the TouchTomorrow Festival, held in conjunction with the 2015 Sample Return Robot Challenge, Saturday, June 13, 2015 at the Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) in Worcester, Mass. Sixteen teams competed for a $ million NASA prize purse. Teams will be required to demonstrate autonomous robots that can locate and collect samples from a wide and varied terrain, operating without human control. The objective of this NASA-WPI Centennial Challenge is to encourage innovations in autonomous navigation and robotics technologies. Innovations stemming from the challenge may improve NASA's capability to explore a variety of destinations in space, as well as enhance the nation's robotic technology for use in industries and applications on Earth.

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Keywords: 2015, challenge, festival, institute, joel, kowsky, ma, massachusetts, nasa, news, polytechnic, return, robot, sample, steve, swanson, touchtomorrow, usa, worcester