Resource investigation for Kichiji rockfish by autonomous underwater vehicle in Kitami-Yamato bank off Northern Japan

Abstract

Expensive kichiji rockfish is important catch for fishers and decreas significantly by over fishing. Common investigation method by the trawl for the fish is difficult to survey on rough terrain and need for big support of the ship. This paper proposes resource investigation method for kichiji rockfish using autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) Tuna-Sand, and image processing method for precise measurement of the fish length. The AUV Tuna-Sand was developed for survey of material and energy resources in deep-sea such, and can observe natural seafloor automatically using only mounted sensors and devices. Our image processing makes a photograph possible to measure accurately the fish length by color correction for removing the unevenness of the brightness and distortion correction. The AUV Tuna-Sand surveyed for 24 hours in Kitami-Yamato Bank off Northern Japan. The vehicle took about 5,300 pictures of the seafloor during five dives in the bank. 37 kichiji rockfish of about 90 to 340 mm long were in all photographs. The survey results showed the fish of 150 to 200 mm long was most often found in all dives although the number of the othSer long was not many. Six mosaic images made by our method showed that all kichiji rockfish stay on the seafloor by oneself without swam and the shortest distance between kichiji rockfish was 4.0 m.

Underwater Platform for Intelligent Robotics and its Application in Two Visual Tracking Systems

“…In this study, we developed AUV Tuna-Sand2 [9] shown in Fig. 2 on the basis of the technical knowledge of the hovering-type AUV Tuna-Sand [10,11], obtained from The University of Tokyo. Tuna-Sand2 has two pressure-resistant containers, namely, a control hull and a mapping hull as shown in Fig.…”

Experimental analysis of low‐altitude terrain following for hover‐capable flight‐style autonomous underwater vehicles

“…The more manoeuvrable hover‐capable AUVs are typically fitted with thrusters, providing actuation with more degrees of freedom and were used in initial proposals for AUV‐based photographic surveys (Haywood, ; Yoerger, Bradley, & Walden, ). Operating safely in complex terrains and with a requirement to undertake surveys of well‐defined areas of interest (e.g., archaeological ship wreck surveys, Gracias et al, ; Roman & Mather, ), the lower operational speed (Gracias et al, ; Marouchos, Muir, Babcock, & Dunbabin, ; Nishida et al, ; Smale et al, ) combined with the power consumption of the thrusters increases the time and energy cost per covered area (Nishida et al, ; Smale et al, ). Attempting to compromise between the two options, several hover‐enhanced flight‐style vehicles have been developed (e.g., Packard et al, ; Phillips et al, ; Wynn et al, ).…”

Bioenergy Based Power Sources for Mobile Autonomous Robots

“…It could be marine, underwater and supermarine usage, research of water parameters [42], geodetic situation [24], biological resources [20,43], monitoring and control of engineering structures [6,44]. The same absence of permanent energy source makes aerial robots highly sought after in similar fields: monitoring the Earth's surface and scanning the dangerous environments [38].…”