Aquatic Soft Robots for Environmental Sensing

GSTDTAP

项目编号	NE/P003966/1
	Aquatic Soft Robots for Environmental Sensing
	[unavailable]
主持机构	University of Southampton
项目开始年	2016
	2016-06-30
项目结束日期	2017-06-29
资助机构	UK-NERC
项目类别	Research Grant
国家	英国
语种	英语
英文摘要	With the expansion in the oceans of human activities towards more extreme environments, state-of-the-art underwater robotics technologies have progressively become less suited at coping with the increased degree of complexity of their missions. As an example, the offshore oil industry is growingly involved in operating in deeper waters, where delicate ecosystems such as deep-sea corals, sponges and hydrothermal vents are threatened for the first time. Similarly, coastal waters are progressively exposed to more intense pressure from human exploitation. The energy and seabed mining sectors and, more than ever, the marine renewable energy sector, need to acquire baseline and on-going surveys throughout the life history of submerged infrastructures and their interaction with the surrounding ecosystems. Currently, operations of this kind rely extensively on human divers, with partial support from underwater robots, and tend to be prohibitively expensive and dangerous. Traditional robots are simply not suitable to acquiring in-situ measurements in very close proximity to submerged structures or living organisms. In order for the limitations of existing underwater robots to be overcome, an innovative and disruptive approach has to be brought forward. This project will investigate a technology with the potential for this change - aquatic soft-robotics. By leveraging the results and experiences from our previous work, we will develop and study a soft-robotic system which exploits size-change and pulsed-jetting to cancel viscous drag and provide efficient thrust for propulsion and manoeuvring. Combining the results of this study, an efficient manoeuvring system, with the inherent properties of soft robotics (low cost, insensitivity to high pressure at depth, and mitigation of damage to both the robot and the environment in cases of collision) will enable the development of an innovative robotic platform with enhanced mobility for marine environmental monitoring with improved operating capabilities and able to operate in adverse weather, in cluttered aquatic environments and at close proximity with submerged infrastructures or delicate aquatic ecosystems.
来源学科分类	Natural Environment Research
文献类型	项目
条目标识符	http://119.78.100.173/C666/handle/2XK7JSWQ/86254
专题	环境与发展全球科技态势
推荐引用方式 GB/T 7714	[unavailable].Aquatic Soft Robots for Environmental Sensing.2016.