Autonomous underwater vehicles should possess intelligent control software that performs intellectual functions such as cognition, decision and action, which originally belong to the ability of domain expert, since the unmanned underwater robot is required to navigate in hazardous environments where humans do not have direct access to. In this paper, we suggest an intelligent system architectur...

1 Corresponding author’s e-mail: [email protected]. This work was partially supported by a Research Grant from the Hellenic General Secretariat of Research and Technology, PABE 99 – BE118. Abstract-This paper deals with the application of a fuzzy logic based algorithm to the control of Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUVs). Fuzzy controllers are of simper design since they don’t require explic...

The development and testing of Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV) hardware and software is greatly complicated by vehicle inaccessibility during operation. Integrated simulation remotely links vehicle components and support equipment with graphics simulation workstations, allowing complete real-time, pre-mission, pseudo-mission and post-mission visualization and analysis in the lab environment...

This work introduces a new method to calculate the water velocity components of a turbulent water column in the x, y, and z directions using Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV) motion response (referred to as the ‘WVAM method’). The water column velocities were determined by calculating the difference between the motion responses of the vehicle in calm and turbulent water environments. The velo...

We seek to understand and utilize environmental and deliberately produced electromagnetic (EM) signals in the coastal ocean. Our studies are undertaken to provide a means for communicating with and guiding autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) and other autonomous sensor systems, such as moored instruments. We include various EM influences in our models such as environmental noise, seabed electri...

This paper applies a new constant-time, consistent and convergent Simultaneous Localization and Mapping (SLAM) algorithm to an autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV). A constant-time SLAM algorithm offers computation independent of workspace size and is one key component in the development of truly autonomous agents. The real-time deployment of such a system would be a landmark achievement for the...

We seek to understand and utilize environmental and deliberately produced electromagnetic (EM) signals in the coastal ocean. Our studies are undertaken to provide a means for communicating with and guiding autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) and other autonomous sensor systems, such as moored instruments. We include various EM influences in our models such as environmental noise , seabed electr...

A critical bottleneck exists in Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV) design and development. It is tremendously difficult to observe, communicate with and test underwater robots, because they operate in a remote and hazardous environment where physical dynamics and sensing modalities are counterintuitive. An underwater virtual world can comprehensively model all necessary functional characterist...

In this study, a single autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) aims to rendezvous with a submerged leader recovery vehicle through a cluttered and variable operating field. The rendezvous problem is transformed into a nonlinear optimal control problem (NOCP) and then numerical solutions are provided. A penalty function method is utilized to combine the boundary conditions, vehicular and environmen...

The SeaBED autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) is a new imaging platform designed for high resolution optical and acoustic sensing. This low cost vehicle has been specifically designed for use in waters upto 2000 meters to carry out video transects, bathymetric and side-scan sonar surveys. In this paper we detail the systems issues associated with navigation, control, and imaging that led us to...