Swarming Technology for Collaborative Surface and Underwater Vehicles (drones)

The project is part of Region Blekinge and BTH's marine technology initiative.

The project primarily aims to investigate and develop methods for information exchange and cooperation between autonomous surface and underwater vehicles to achieve robust underwater navigation and improved communication

The goal is to establish new methodologies for swarming technology in the combined surface and underwater domain.

As part of this work, the project will design, construct and test suitable surface and underwater vehicles to conduct research at high Technology Readiness Levels (TRLs).

The project includes:

- Modeling and analysis of vehicle dynamics and sensor systems.

- Simulation and development of cooperative algorithms.

- Practical implementation of developed methodology for evaluation.

A key focus will be on applying these methods in real scenarios to test and evaluate their effectiveness. The project will also include the design and construction of the necessary surface and underwater vehicles to support these activities.

Expected outcomes of the project include the development of swarming techniques to perform complex tasks in the ocean domain, providing simultaneous information from both surface and underwater domains.

Applications may include:

- Monitoring of ocean health and other key metrics.

- Monitoring of critical infrastructure.

- Search and rescue operations.

- Exploration of hard-to-reach parts of the ocean.

The developed surface and underwater vehicles will be available for further research in the field and as a testbed for interested actors who want to explore or define desired functionality for drones.