Showing posts with label Underwater. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Underwater. Show all posts
Saturday, February 1, 2014
Friday, October 18, 2013
Researchers Developing ‘Underwater Internet’
Angela Moscaritolo
PCMag.com
Oct. 18, 2013
University at Buffalo researchers are developing a deep-sea computer network that may lead to improvements in tsunami detection, offshore oil and natural gas exploration, surveillance, and pollution monitoring.
“A submerged wireless network will give us an unprecedented ability to collect and analyze data from our oceans in real time,” Tommaso Melodia, UB associate professor of electrical engineering and the project’s lead researcher, said in a statement. “Making this information available to anyone with a smartphone or computer, especially when a tsunami or other type of disaster occurs, could help save lives.”
The framework Melodia and his team are developing would transmit data from existing and planned underwater sensor networks to laptops, smartphones, and other wireless devices in real time. It also would allow the many disparate underwater communication systems around the world to communicate with each other, effectively creating a deep-sea Internet.
This article was posted: Friday, October 18, 2013 at 9:39 am
Tags: internet, science, technology
Researchers Developing ‘Underwater Internet’
Friday, September 6, 2013
DARPA goes deep: New Hydra project to see underwater drones deploying drones
Published time: September 06, 2013 11:19
The sky is no longer the limit for US drone warfare, with secret military research agency DARPA considering a conquest of the seven seas with an underwater drone carrier.
America’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) recently held a presentation of its new Hydra unmanned underwater drone carrier project at John’s Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory. ‘Proposer’s Day’ was set to beef up interest from defense contractors.
“The Hydra program will develop and demonstrate an unmanned undersea system, providing a novel delivery mechanism for insertion of unmanned air and underwater vehicles into operational environments,” says the Hydra Proposers’ Day website.
In order to tout military contractors, DARPA’s Tactical Technology Office (TTO) envisages that their Hydra unmanned submarine carrier would use “modular payloads within a standardized enclosure to enable scalable, cost-effective deployment of rapid response assets.”
Hydra network is expected to be capable of deploying both the unmanned underwater vehicles (UUVs) and ‘conventional’ unmanned aircraft (UAVs), notably all of that remaining submerged. Also DARPA engineers consider developing for the submersible a special capsule for stealth underwater transportation of troops.
“The rising number of ungoverned states, piracy, and proliferation of sophisticated defenses severely stretches current resources and impacts the nation’s ability to conduct special operations and contingency missions,” DARPA’s proposal paper maintains.
In broader terms, the Hydra project implies building an underwater drone fleet to ensure surveillance, logistics and offensive capabilities at any given time globally, throughout the world’s oceans, including shallow waters and probably any river deltas or systems.
“The climate of budget austerity runs up against an uncertain security environment,” said Hydra program manager Scott Littlefield in a media release. “An unmanned technology infrastructure staged below the ocean’s surface could relieve some of that resource strain and expand military capabilities in this increasingly challenging space.”
DARPA’s gadget gurus believe they’ll have a functional demo of an underwater Hydra drone network by 2018, in case they find sufficient funding.
This all sounds sci-fi, yet drones deploying drones could be the future of unmanned warfare. Concurrently with the Hydra project, DARPA is developing a similar program with Lockheed Martin aimed at developing unmanned vehicles and drones to supply troops by air and land.
Last January DARPA also announced another program exploring an upward falling payloads (UFPs) concept, implying storage of necessary supplies on seabed in waterproof containers. Yet the UFP and Hydra are two separate projects, a DARPA spokesman stressed.
“The basic difference is that UFP involves systems deployed at the bottom of the deep sea for years at a time, while Hydra plans for modules in shallower water that are submerged for weeks or months at a time,” he explained the difference on request from InformationWeek.
The Hydra platform might also be in demand in case of natural disasters, as drones could deliver emergency equipment close to coastline of the affected areas.
“Hydra will integrate existing and emerging technologies in new ways to create an alternate means of delivering a variety of payloads close to the point of use,” informs DARPA, which eyes the not-so-remote future primarily through the prism of military application of innovative technology.
With all the technological ambitions in hand, DARPA may soon be seen setting Guillermo del Toro’s movie ‘Pacific Rim’ as benchmark. In any case, surfers in, say, 2020, will have to act with discretion. Who knows what will be watching them from underneath.
DARPA goes deep: New Hydra project to see underwater drones deploying drones
Thursday, July 25, 2013
DARPA Looking to Build Underwater Drone ‘Mothership’
DARPA Headquarters (Photo: Wikimedia Commons)
RT
July 25, 2013
The much-vaunted DARPA , which is tasked with expanding technology and science for use in defense projects, is now looking to build an unmanned undersea system that can deploy stealthy drones, both of the flying variety and unmanned underwater vehicles (UUVs), via a large carrier craft.
“The Hydra large UUV is to use modular payloads inside a standardized enclosure to deploy a mix of UAVs and UUVs, depending on the military situation. Hydra will integrate existing and emerging technologies in new ways to create an alternate means of delivering a variety of payloads close to where they’re needed.”
Based on current available technology, drones will be launched under the surface of the water much as submarines currently launch cruise missiles, within encapsulated vehicles that then surface and allow drones to launch into the air.
Though the Hydra project appears to be in its beginning stages, it would seem that much of the technology already in use by the US Navy can be adapted. Similarly, the rate at which the US has deployed increasingly sophisticated iterations of its conventional drones suggests that defense contractors could quickly adapt units to be usable with the new Hydra vessel.
Raytheon’s 6 lb. Switchblade drone, for example, which is 2 feet in length and can be carried in a backpack is already being adapted for launch from submarines. Other smaller, insect-like drones currently being developed by DARPA could all conceivably be useful for the Hydra project as well.
Currently DARPA is also looking into ways to launch and land drones from smaller surface ships, such as the Navy’s Littoral class, under a program dubbed the Tactically Exploited Reconnaissance Node (TERN).
According to DARPA, which announced the Tern program specifications only a few months ago, it is looking to give the US Navy the capabilities to launch drones without the need for large aircraft carriers or land bases.
Currently the Navy is limited to using only a handful of drone models, including the ScanEagle drone, and the Fire Scout unmanned helicopter based on Littoral Combat Ships.
In conjunction with the new Hydra project, it seems that DARPA is looking to modify the American navy into a force capable of deploying versatile unmanned robots throughout the globe.
DARPA Looking to Build Underwater Drone ‘Mothership’
Tuesday, June 4, 2013
10 Stunning Underwater Photos
This ghostly photo of a harbor seal, snapped at a kelp forest at Cortes bank near San Diego, took the grand prize in the competition, and for good reason. Look at that seal! It’s like a hyper-stylized movie with a marine setting. Kudos and congrats to Kyle McBurnie of California.
Popular Science – New Technology, Science News, The Future Now
10 Stunning Underwater Photos
10 Stunning Underwater Photos
Featuring a ghostly seal, a stylish crab, and more. You’re welcome!
Posted 06.04.2013 at 2:15 pm
Best Overall This ghostly photo of a harbor seal, snapped at a kelp forest at Cortes bank near San Diego, took the grand prize in the competition, and for good reason. Look at that seal! It’s like a hyper-stylized movie with a marine setting. Kudos and congrats to Kyle McBurnie of California. University Of Miami/Rosenstiel School Of Marine & Atmospheric Science/Kyle McBurnie
Every year since 2005, the University of Miami’s Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science has judged a crop of photos for consideration in its Underwater Photography Contest. The winners and runners-up–in categories including wide-angle and portrait–are always unbelievable. We’ve collected our 10 favorites here from the 2013 contest in the gallery here.
Popular Science – New Technology, Science News, The Future Now
10 Stunning Underwater Photos
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