Stone Aerospace

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Aerospace engineering firm founded by Bill Stone

title: "Stone Aerospace" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["aerospace-engineering-organizations", "aerospace-companies-of-the-united-states", "robotics-companies-of-the-united-states"] description: "Aerospace engineering firm founded by Bill Stone" topic_path: "engineering" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stone_Aerospace" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Aerospace engineering firm founded by Bill Stone ::

Stone Aerospace is an aerospace engineering firm founded by engineer and explorer Bill Stone, located in Del Valle, a suburb of Austin, Texas.

History

Bill Stone began Stone Aerospace as a part-time consulting business in 1999, at which time he was working at the National Institute of Standards and Technology. At the time, Stone already had an extensive background in underground and underwater exploration, which had led him to develop several technologies to further human exploration capabilities. This background, and in particular the success of the Wakulla II Project in Wakulla Springs, Florida, which employed Stone's human-navigated digital wall mapper, lead to inquiries as to whether it would be possible to design an autonomous underwater vehicle, which could explore on its own, making exploration possible where it was not safe or possible for human divers to go. After submitting several proposals to NASA, in 2003 DEPTHX was funded.

Shortly thereafter Stone's Piedra-Sombra Corporation began doing business as Stone Aerospace in Del Valle, Texas. After the successful autonomous exploration by DEPTHX of several cenotes in Mexico, NASA then funded the ENDURANCE Project, which spent two seasons exploring frozen-over lakes in the Dry Valleys of Antarctica. Project VALKYRIE was awarded NASA funding in 2010, and it was field-tested in Matanuska Glacier, Alaska in 2015. Currently, Stone Aerospace is further refining its technologies to produce a full sized cryobot called SPINDLE.

DEPTHX

Main article: DEPTHX

DEPTHX was a NASA-funded project for which Stone Aerospace was the Principal Investigator. Co-investigators included Carnegie Mellon University, which was responsible for the navigation and guidance software, the Southwest Research Institute, which built the vehicle's science payload, and research scientists from the University of Texas at Austin, the Colorado School of Mines, and NASA Ames Research Center. The DEPTHX vehicle was a fully autonomous underwater vehicle outfitted with scientific sampling equipment designed to expand upon the limits of human underwater exploration, and was successfully tested over two field seasons in cenotes in south east Mexico. (the first such discovery by a robotic vehicle) and the first use of three-dimensional simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM).

ENDURANCE

Main article: ENDURANCE

The NASA-funded ENDURANCE project built upon the successes of DEPTHX. The DEPTHX vehicle itself was reconfigured to create ENDURANCE, with a new science payload and new navigation systems added to meet the challenges particular to the frozen-over environment in Antarctica, where it spent two field seasons. ENDURANCE spent two seasons exploring West Lake Bonney in the Dry Valleys, autonomously collecting aqueous chemistry data as well as making high-resolution maps of the lake floor and the portion of Taylor Glacier which interfaces with the lake. The results are thought to be one of the most comprehensive three-dimensional biogeochemical maps of any lake on the planet.

VALKYRIE

In 2011, NASA awarded Stone Aerospace $4 million to fund the Phase 2 of project VALKYRIE (Very-Deep Autonomous Laser-Powered Kilowatt-Class Yo-Yoing Robotic Ice Explorer). This project created an autonomous cryobot capable of melting through vast amounts of ice. The 5 kW power source on the surface uses optic fiber to conduct a high-energy laser beam to produce hot water jets that melt the ice ahead. Some beam energy is converted to electricity via photovoltaic cells to power on-board electronics and jet pumps. Phase 2 of project VALKYRIE consisted of testing a scaled-down version of the cryobot in Matanuska Glacier, Alaska in 2015.

SPINDLE

Main article: Spindle (vehicle)

Stone Aerospace is now integrating a prototype submersible called ARTEMIS (4.3 m long, 1,270 kg) with the VALKYRIE technology to produce SPINDLE. This phase will use a full-scale version of the cryobot which will melt its way to an Antarctic subglacial lake —Lake Vostok— to collect samples, and then resurface. The vehicle features a radar integrated to an intelligent algorithm for autonomous scientific sampling and navigation through ice and water. This phase of the project would be viewed as a precursor to possible future missions to an icy moon.

Sunfish

Stone Aerospave developed an autonomous underwater vehicle called Sunfish that was used to map flooded caves in Florida (Peacock Springs) in 2017–2018 and Namibia (Lake Guinas, Harasib Cave, and Dragon's Breath Cave) in 2019, and Hudson Grotto in Florida in 2020.

References

References

  1. [http://www.stoneaerospace.com/about-us/about-us-history.php Stone Aerospace History] {{webarchive. link. (2013-01-05 . Stone Aerospace. Retrieved: 6 March 2012.)
  2. [http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/nasa-robot-completes-test-drive-of-exploration-capabilities-58725857.html NASA Robot Completes Test Drive of Exploration Capabilities] PR Newswire. 31 May 2007
  3. [https://web.archive.org/web/20100722061339/http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/36322469#.T1fVw4fYeSo Antarctic diving robot practices for Europa]. MSNBC Today Tech. 9 April 2010.
  4. [http://www.space.com/29644-cryobot-tunneling-robot-explore-icy-moons.html Tunneling Cryobot Robot May Explore Icy Moons], Keith Cooper, ''Astrobiology Magazine'', June 13, 2015.
  5. [http://www.popularmechanics.com/space/deep-space/a16591/tunneling-into-the-solar-systems-subsurface-oceans-to-search-for-life/ Testing the Space-Bound Submarines That Will Explore Alien Oceans]. Jay Bennett, ''Popular Mechanics''. 24 July 2015.
  6. [http://www.frc.ri.cmu.edu/depthx/about.html About the DEPTHX Project]. Carnegie Mellon Field Robotics Center. Retrieved 25 March 2012.
  7. [http://www.popsci.com/node/9266 Robot Subs in Space]. Popular Science. 1 Feb 2007.
  8. (2010). "A comparative molecular analysis of water-filled limestone sinkholes in north-eastern Mexico". Environmental Microbiology.
  9. [http://www.stoneaerospace.com/products-pages/products-DEPTHX.php DEPTHX (DEep Phreatic THermal eXplorer)] {{webarchive. link. (2015-11-22 . Stone Aerospace. Retrieved 25 March 2012.)
  10. The principal investigator for ENDURANCE was [[Peter Doran]] of the [[University of Illinois at Chicago]]. Co-investigators were Stone Aerospace, [[John Charles Priscu. John Priscu]] of [[Montana State University]], and NASA Ames Research Center.[http://www.stoneaerospace.com/news-/news-antarctica09-overview.php ENDURANCE 2009 Field Season] {{webarchive. link. (2012-09-14 . Stone Aerospace. Retrieved 29 March 2012.)
  11. [http://www.stoneaerospace.com/products-pages/products-ENDURANCE.php ENDURANCE(Environmentally Non-Disturbing Under-ice Robotic ANtarctiC Explorer)] {{webarchive. link. (2013-02-03 . Stone Aerospace. Retrieved 29 March 2012.)
  12. [https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/33B377D112246F4F0EE48CC8EEA8EAB0/S0260305500254487a.pdf/div-class-title-progress-towards-an-optically-powered-cryobot-div.pdf Progress towards an optically powered cryobot]. (PDF). W.C. STONE, B. HOGAN, V. SIEGEL, S. LELIEVRE, C. FLESHER. ''Annals of Glaciology''. Issue 55, No. 65. 2014. {{doi. 10.3189/2014AoG65A200
  13. "Stone Aerospace - Smart Tools, Systems, and Vehicles for Exploring and Commercializing the Frontier". stoneaerospace.com.
  14. (April 19, 2012). "Cryobots Could Drill Into Icy Moons With Remote Fiber-Optic Laser Power".
  15. [https://www.vice.com/en/article/alien-hunting-sub-europa-artemis-stone-aerospace/ An Alien-Hunting Submarine Is Being Tested in Antarctica]. Daniel Oberhaus, ''Motherboard''. 7 May 2017.
  16. [http://www.ursi.org/proceedings/procGA17/papers/Paper_F39-3(2499).pdf DESIGN OF A FORWARD LOOKING SYNTHETIC APERTURE RADAR FOR AN AUTONOMOUS CRYOBOT FOR SUBSURFACE EXPLORATION OF EUROPA]. (PDF). Omkar Pradhan, Srikumar Sandeep, Albin J. Gasiewski, and William Stone. 2017.
  17. [https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/international-journal-of-astrobiology/article/an-intelligent-algorithm-for-autonomous-scientific-sampling-with-the-valkyrie-cryobot/FC28DCA6D4CC8E2F3A2803984C269C5A An intelligent algorithm for autonomous scientific sampling with the VALKYRIE cryobot]. Evan B. Clark, Nathan E. Bramall, Brent Christner, Chris Flesher, et al. ''International Journal of Astrobiology'' 25 September 2017. {{doi. 10.1017/S1473550417000313
  18. (23 March 2012). "Say Hello to an Extraterrestrial Ocean — and Maybe Extraterrestrial Life".
  19. [https://astrobiology.nasa.gov/news/robotic-tunneler-may-explore-icy-moons/ Robotic Tunneler May Explore Icy Moons]. Keith Cooper, ''Astrobiology at NASA''. 7 July 2015.
  20. Schöll, Oliver. (6 November 2024). "Deep in Dragon's Breath". InDepth magazine.
  21. Orlando, Alex. (3 February 2020). "This AI-Guided Drone Has Mapped One of Earth's Deepest Subterranean Lakes".
  22. "Dragon's Breath Cave: 2-dimensional map".

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