Details of Award
NERC Reference : NE/P003966/1
Aquatic Soft Robots for Environmental Sensing
Grant Award
- Principal Investigator:
- Dr GD Weymouth, University of Southampton, Faculty of Engineering & the Environment
- Science Area:
- Atmospheric
- Earth
- Freshwater
- Marine
- Terrestrial
- Overall Classification:
- Unknown
- ENRIs:
- Biodiversity
- Environmental Risks and Hazards
- Global Change
- Natural Resource Management
- Pollution and Waste
- Science Topics:
- Robotics & Autonomy
- Actuators
- Bio-inspired Robotics
- Mobile Robots
- Robot Control
- Underwater Autonomous Vehicles
- Abstract:
- 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.
- NERC Reference:
- NE/P003966/1
- Grant Stage:
- Completed
- Scheme:
- Directed (RP) - NR1
- Grant Status:
- Closed
- Programme:
- Tech Proof of Concept
This grant award has a total value of £103,724
FDAB - Financial Details (Award breakdown by headings)
| DI - Other Costs | Indirect - Indirect Costs | DA - Investigators | DA - Estate Costs | DI - Staff | DI - T&S | DA - Other Directly Allocated |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| £16,129 | £31,741 | £4,243 | £9,432 | £32,615 | £8,065 | £1,497 |
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