Coralligenous habitats are of special interest in the Mediterranean Sea because they represent one of the most important biodiversity ‘hot-spots’ and are considered of great relevance for fisheries activities in the region. Despite their importance, however, there are missing consensual methodologies for their monitoring and, despite some attempts, no environmental or ecological quality indices have been established yet. This situation could be related to the difficulties associated with their exploration and their spatial heterogeneity. These habitats are in urgent need of efficient standard monitoring and management protocols programmes to develop an effective network for their conservation. Here we reviewed the available methodologies and robotics tools used to evaluate and monitor benthic habitats, highlighting the importance of defining rapid cost-effective sampling and analyses approaches and architectures for future monitoring of changes in coralligenous habitats based on current technological developments. We identified still images acquisitions as the most effective data gathering system. Stereo photogrammetry, photomosaic elaboration and three-dimensional (3D) modelling may largely improve the data analysis and therefore the quality status assessment of the coralligenous habitats. The advantage and efficiency of different approaches and methods, and whether they should be applied and standardised for further monitoring activities, were discussed.
A B S T R A C TThe use of versatile and multipurpose robotic systems in underwater sites constitutes a high-value technology, useful in the exploration, monitoring, and documentation of important archaeological findings or biological parameters. Intervention must always be nondestructive, noninvasive, and delicate; for this reason, it is important to develop tools and systems that allow telepresence and improve the pilot's ability to work in conditions and environments that are dangerous and often inaccessible for divers. One of the most important objectives of underwater robotic research includes developing easy-to-use devices and systems that can safely and efficiently be operated by relatively inexperienced operators. Nowadays, archaeological and marine sanctuaries require a significant budget to be studied and preserved by national and international organizations because of their large number and the challenges related to conducting surveys with "light" equipment and robots. This paper presents a set of tools and technological solutions developed with the common aim of improving the efficiency of diving operations and commercial lowcost micro-ROVs (remotely operated vehicles) in surveying and documenting fragile underwater sites. In particular, this paper describes a force feedback joystick for ROV precise guidance and positioning, an innovative 3D live streaming capability for better perception of the work environment, and an innovative cloud strategy for processing, archiving, and elaborating on underwater data at the time of survey. Results have demonstrated that the developed tools significantly improve the efficiency of survey investigations performed directly by scientists and that they have a variety of applications and their design prepares them for future integration.
Recent years have seen an increasingly interest by the scientific community in the realization of minimally invasive technologies and tools for carrying out activities like exploration and intervention in the marine environment. This paper will describe the design and realization of a novel assisted guidance system for a Micro ROV, which is part of a more complex robotic system, together with a large ROV. Within this framework, the smaller robot is employed as a mobile appendix of the larger one, while the latter acts as an actuated garage and a supply vessel of the first. During operations, the ROVs guidance systems are decoupled, that is the larger one works in station keeping or in path following, either automatically or under the supervision of an expert operator, while the smaller one is teleoperated by a pilot not necessarily trained. This structure allows scientists like marine biologists, archaeologists and oceanographers to operate directly the Micro ROV, combining their knowledge of the application domain with the ability of professional ROV pilots. The described robotic structure is potentially very efficient and versatile, but its realization implies the development of solutions which could support the Micro ROV untrained operators. For this reason, the present paper focuses on the description of an assisted guidance system for Micro ROV aimed at achieving the objective above. The system makes the Micro ROVs pilot keep the vehicle within a given range from the large ROV, by means of a reactive joystick. Generation of the reactive force is described, and the use of the assisted guidance system in performing underwater data gathering missions of an archaeological site is discussed.
Due to its applications in marine research, oceanographic, and undersea exploration, Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUVs) and the related control algorithms has been recently under intense investigation. In this work, we address target detection and tracking issues, proposing a control strategy which is able to benefit from the cooperation among robots within the fleet. In particular, we introduce a behavior-based planner for cooperative AUVs, proposing an algorithm able to search and recognize targets, in both static and dynamic scenarios. With no a priori information about the surrounding environment, robots cover an unknown area with the goal of finding objects of interest. When a target is found, the AUVs' goal become to classify it (fixed target) or track it (mobile target), with no information about target trajectory and with the constraint on maintaining the formation. Results demonstrate the good overall performance of the proposed algorithm in both scenarios.
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