Autonomous sailboats: an emerging technology for ocean sampling and surveillance

• Type: Article in International Conference Proceedings Book
• Date: 2008

Authors

Nuno A. Cruz (Author) FEUP; José Carlos Alves (Author) Other

Conference proceedings International

Title: OCEANS 2008, VOLS 1-4

Pages: 2091-2096

OCEANS 2008 Conference

Quebec City, CANADA, SEP 15-18, 2008

Indexing

ISI Proceedings

ISI Web of Knowledge - 8 Citations

Scopus - 43 Citations

INSPEC

Scientific classification

FOS: Engineering and technology > Environmental engineering

Other information

Authenticus ID: P-004-4AC

DOI: 10.1109/oceans.2008.5152113

Abstract (EN): Autonomous sailboats are robotic vessels that use wind energy for propulsion and control the sails and rudders without human intervention. The use of autonomous sailboats for ocean sampling has been tentatively proposed before, but there have been minor efforts towards the development and deployment of actual prototypes, due to a number of technical limitations and significant risks of operation. Currently, most of the limitations have been surpassed, with the availability of extremely low power electronics, flexible computational systems, reliable communication devices and high performance renewable power sources. At the same time, some of the major risks have been mitigated, allowing this emerging technology to become an effective tool for a wide range of applications in real scenarios. We illustrate some of these scenarios and we describe the status of the current efforts being made to develop operational prototypes.

Language: English

Type (Professor's evaluation): Scientific

No. of pages: 6