Guest Editorial Cutting edge autonomous underwater vehicle technology

Abstract

This special issue focuses on the rapidly evolving technologies on autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs). AUVs are now widely used in the world as a useful tool to explore underwater environments. We would like to share an overview of the latest state of the AUV technologies and applications, and evoke discussions on current challenges and future developments. The special issue features invited prominent papers from the Joint Symposium/Workshop 2016 IEEE OES Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV 2016), which was held in November 2016 at the University of Tokyo, Japan. It is a biannual workshop organized by the IEEE Oceanic Engineering Society (OES). This event has now become a well-established and prestigious international gathering of some of the best in the field. This time, the workshop was held in Asia for the first time. In total, 73 papers were presented, attracting 133 participants from 20 countries. The workshop covers all topics relevant to AUVs, from component technologies to operation, in single-track sessions providing opportunities for the researchers and engineers to discuss the relevant technologies in detail. Today, as AUVs become commercially available and operated around the world, we believe the workshop should address not only the technology to develop a new AUV, but also cover more extensive interests related to AUVs - from the know how obtained through operation to the data collected by AUVs. We tried to incorporate this idea into the program. The special issue papers are briefly summarized.