The NASA Rover Challenge is a NASA competition ran by Marshall Space Flight Center. North Dakota State University had a competing team again this year. Students are required to design a vehicle that addresses a series of engineering problems that are similar to problems faced by the original Moonbuggy team. Each rover is human powered and carries two students, one female and one male, over a half-mile simulated lunar terrain course including craters, rocks, lava ridges, inclines and lunar soil.
Moonbuggy entries are proof-of-concept and engineering test model in nature, rather than final production models. Each student team of six members is responsible for building their own buggy, and the course drivers, who are chosen from each team, must also be builders of the vehicle.