Abstract
This paper focuses on safe navigation of an unmanned surface vehicle in proximity to a submerged autonomous underwater vehicle so as to maximise short-range, through-water data transmission while minimising the probability that the two vehicles will accidentally collide. A sliding mode navigation law is developed, and a rigorous proof of optimality of the proposed navigation law is presented. The developed navigation algorithm is relatively computationally simple and easily implementable in real time. Illustrative examples with extensive computer simulations demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.
Highlights
Recent technological developments have made autonomous and unmanned maritime vehicles realistic alternatives to traditional vessel-based survey and monitoring systems [1]
We address the problem of a unmanned surface vehicles (USVs) and an autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) navigating collaboratively to exchange data at close range
The AUV could come to the surface for data transmission via one or more terrestrial communication systems (e.g., Wi-Fi), but in doing so it would lose most of its control authority while being exposed to rapidly changing sea surface conditions and the risk of collision with vessels [6]
Summary
Recent technological developments have made autonomous and unmanned maritime vehicles realistic alternatives to traditional vessel-based survey and monitoring systems [1]. Teams consisting of collaborating vehicles of both types can be used in applications that include safety and rescue missions, environmental disaster assessment, underwater geology, marine archeology, military survey, and detection and monitoring of marine fauna [2]. The AUV could come to the surface for data transmission via one or more terrestrial communication systems (e.g., Wi-Fi), but in doing so it would lose most of its control authority while being exposed to rapidly changing sea surface conditions and the risk of collision with vessels [6] We leave this difficult problem for future investigation and consider a different scenario; transmission of data while the AUV remains submerged, noting that underwater data exchange using acoustic modems is notoriously slow, unreliable and range-dependent [7].
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