The light autonomous underwater vehicle: Evolutions and networking

Abstract

This paper presents the LAUV (Light Autonomous Underwater Vehicle), with special emphasis on the most recent developments and discusses how the LAUV enables networked operations. The LAUV is a lightweight, one-man-portable vehicle specially designed to be a highly operational and effective surveying tool for oceanographic, hydrographic, security and inspections applications. The LAUV is evolving rapidly to bridge the gap between theory and operations by enabling concepts of operation which could have only been imagined before. This is done with state of the art developments in control, navigation and communications, and also by integrating the most recent developments in sensor, computation, and communications technologies with the help of the Neptus/IMC/Dune software tool chain. The software tool chain enables rapid prototyping and evaluation of new concepts of operation for networked vehicle systems. Neptus/IMC/Dune endow the LAUV with unique networking capabilities, allowing transparent interactions with multiple users, and with other air and ocean vehicle systems. The paper describes the LAUV and its most recent evolutions regarding navigation, bottom tracking and obstacle avoidance algorithms, command and control framework and networking capabilities.