Experiments in multi-vehicle operations: The Rapid Environmental Picture Atlantic exercise 2014

Sousa, João Borges de; Pereira, João; Alves, João; Galocha, Madaleno; Pereira, Baptista; Lourenco, C; Portuguesa, Marinha

doi:10.1109/oceans-genova.2015.7271761

Cited by 5 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 13 publications

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“…The distributed architecture of Neptus is a service-oriented architecture that enables high degrees of interoperability (between applications), scalability (number of nodes), and reconfiguration (number and kind of nodes). NEPTUS has been used in many at-sea tests such as the Rapid Environmental Picture Atlantic exercise 2014 (de Sousa et al, 2015 ). This experiment, involving more than 10 military and civil organizations, emphasized multi-domain missions in order to foster interoperability and cooperation between UMVs and aerial vehicles.…”

Section: Interoperability Background and Relevant Literaturementioning

confidence: 99%

Interoperability Among Unmanned Maritime Vehicles: Review and First In-field Experimentation

et al. 2020

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Complex maritime missions, both above and below the surface, have traditionally been carried out by manned surface ships and submarines equipped with advanced sensor systems. Unmanned Maritime Vehicles (UMVs) are increasingly demonstrating their potential for improving existing naval capabilities due to their rapid deployability, easy scalability, and high reconfigurability, offering a reduction in both operational time and cost. In addition, they mitigate the risk to personnel by leaving the man far-from-the-risk but in-the-loop of decision making. In the long-term, a clear interoperability framework between unmanned systems, human operators, and legacy platforms will be crucial for effective joint operations planning and execution. However, the present multi-vendor multi-protocol solutions in multi-domain UMVs activities are hard to interoperate without common mission control interfaces and communication protocol schemes. Furthermore, the underwater domain presents significant challenges that cannot be satisfied with the solutions developed for terrestrial networks. In this paper, the interoperability topic is discussed blending a review of the technological growth from 2000 onwards with recent authors' in-field experience; finally, important research directions for the future are given. Within the broad framework of interoperability in general, the paper focuses on the aspect of interoperability among UMVs not neglecting the role of the human operator in the loop. The picture emerging from the review demonstrates that interoperability is currently receiving a high level of attention with a great and diverse deal of effort. Besides, the manuscript describes the experience from a sea trial exercise, where interoperability has been demonstrated by integrating heterogeneous autonomous UMVs into the NATO Centre for Maritime Research and Experimentation (CMRE) network, using different robotic middlewares and acoustic modem technologies to implement a multistatic active sonar system. A perspective for the interoperability in marine robotics missions emerges in the paper, through a discussion of current capabilities, in-field experience and future advanced technologies unique to UMVs. Nonetheless, their application spread is slowed down by the lack of human confidence. In fact, an interoperable system-of-systems of autonomous UMVs will require operators involved only at a supervisory level. As trust develops, endorsed by stable and mature interoperability, human monitoring will be diminished to exploit the tremendous potential of fully autonomous UMVs.

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Section: Interoperability Background and Relevant Literaturementioning

confidence: 99%

Interoperability Among Unmanned Maritime Vehicles: Review and First In-field Experimentation

et al. 2020

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“…The work in this manuscript builds upon the LSTS toolchain which has extensive operational use in recurring large scale exercises [34,51], is open-source and with a growing group of users and contributors such as Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI), Laboratory for Underwater Systems and Technologies (LABUST), Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) and Centre for Maritime Research and Experimentation (NATO-CMRE), among others. Furthermore, the use of the LSTS toolchain as a baseline proves advantageous for scalable use of the tool due to the ongoing adaptation of the toolchain to other communication protocols (e.g., MAVLink, JANUS, MOOS) and compatibility with vehicles from other manufacturers (e.g., LRAUV, Waveglider, IVER, SPARUS II).…”

Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

Advancing multi-vehicle deployments in oceanographic field experiments

Ferreira

Costa

et al. 2018

Auton Robot

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Our research concerns the coordination and control of robotic vehicles for upper water-column oceanographic observations. In such an environment, operating multiple vehicles to observe dynamic oceanographic phenomena, such as ocean processes and marine life, from fronts to cetaceans, has required that we design, implement and operate software, methods and processes which can support opportunistic needs in real-world settings with substantial constraints. In this work, an approach for coordinated measurements using such platforms, which relate directly to task outcomes, is presented. We show the use and operational value of a new Artificial Intelligence (AI) based mixedinitiative system for handling multiple platforms along with the networked infrastructure support needed to

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