Autonomous underwater vehicles: future platforms for fisheries acoustics

Abstract

Autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) are unmanned submersibles that can be pre-programmed to navigate in three dimensions under water. The technological advances required for reliable deployment, mission control, performance, and recovery of AUVs have developed considerably over the past 10 years. Currently, there are several vehicles operating successfully in the offshore industries as well as in the applied and academic oceanographic sciences. This article reviews the application of AUVs to fisheries- and plankton-acoustics research. Specifications of the main AUVs currently in operation are given. Compared to traditional platforms for acoustic instruments, AUVs can sample previously impenetrable environments such as the sea surface, the deep sea, and under-sea ice. Furthermore, AUVs are typically small, quiet, and have the potential to operate at low cost and be unconstrained by the vagaries of weather. Examples of how these traits may be utilized in fisheries-acoustics science are given with reference to previous work in the North Sea and Southern Ocean and to potential future applications. Concurrent advances in multi-beam sonar technology and species identification, using multi-frequency and broadband sonars, will further enhance the utility of AUVs for fisheries acoustics. However, before many of the more prospective applications can be accomplished, advances in power-source technology are required to increase the range of operation. The paper ends by considering developments that may turn AUVs from objects sometimes perceived as science fiction into instruments used routinely to gather scientific facts.

Variable buoyancy system metric

“…Utilizing new technologies in sensors, acoustics, computing, lighting, imagery, and batteries, the AUV has become a technologically advanced and useful ocean exploration and instumentation platform [7]. With a range of vehicle size and capabilities, AUVs are being developed to perform routine tasks that may be dangerous, expensive, or inaccessible to other types of platforms.…”

“…Having a neutrally buoyant vehicle will also add maneuverability, allowing vehicles to easily hover or reverse directions. Using less propulsion will reduce the noise of already quiet vehicles [7], thereby reducing disturbance to biology, sediment, and acoustic measurements. Lastly, an advanced VB system can potentially increase the payload capacity for sample retrieval, a direct benefit to scientific results, as well as total operating cost.…”

Mesophotic Coral Ecosystems: A Geoacoustically Derived Proxy for Habitat and Relative Diversity for the Leeward Shelf of Bonaire, Dutch Caribbean

“…Other aspects of the marine environment can also be surveyed. For example, nekton can be identified from acoustic returns (Fernandes et al, 2003;Patterson et al, 2007) and water quality parameters can also be simultaneously surveyed from AUVs (Moline et al, 2005).…”

An Improved Collaborative Algorithm with Artificial Neural Network in Multidisciplinary Design Optimization of AUV

“…Over the years, Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUVs) have a very significant value in military applications, homeland security, hydrographic surveys, mineral field surveys, air crash investigations and scientific research [1]. They are capable of carrying a variety of sensor payloads for marine geoscience research in complex ocean environment.…”