Design of Smart Magnetometer as Sensor Node for Seafloor Geomagnetic Observatory

Seafloor observatories have been the important way to observe the ocean, but applying the magnetometers to it still remain technical problems. This paper presents a smart cheaper magnetometer which was designed as the sensor node for a small seafloor network for geomagnetic observation. System design was described in modules at first. The calibration method of the whole system so as to alleviate the intrinsic magnetism was introduced secondly. In order to orient the magnetometer when putted on seafloor, the azimuth arithmetic for IMU (Initial Measurement Unit) was demonstrated afterwards. Finally, the data from a sea trial was given and the assumption to construct a seafloor geomagnetic observatory network was promoted.