Credit: Ken Kamrin and Shashank Agarwal, Massachusetts Institute of Technology; and Daniel Goldman and Andras Karsai, Georgia Tech
Scientists and engineers from MIT and Georgia Tech are enabling near real-time modeling of wheels, tank treads, and desert animals traveling at high speeds across sandy terrains. “Dynamic Resistive Force Theory,” or DRFT modeling, illustrated here, provides a blueprint for speedier granular modeling — and a path to help design better desert vehicles, and Mars and lunar rovers.