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Design of an Autonomous Underwater Vehicle
Students: Christopher Gilligan, Michael Degnan, Kenneth Koehler, Emmanouil Zannis
Advisor: Professor S. Thangam
ONR AUVSI 2001 competition
Sponsor:
School of Engineering & Mechanical Engineering Department
The Autonomous Underwater Vehicle objective is to create a submarine within a restricted size that will initially go through a gate, locate a homing beacon and retrieve the nearby ring. To meet the competition’s requirements, the submarine may not be guided by anything external including GPS. The size of the submarine is also limited to 2 ft. x 3 ft. x 6 ft. The submarine will use data from three sensors to correct its position in the water until the beacon and ring has been found. The sensors are hydrophones to detect the acoustic ping of the beacon, a camera for short-range visual identification of the ring, and sonar for obstacle avoidance and path correction. When the submarine is placed in the water, camera and sonar processing will navigate the AUV through the initial rectangular gate. The hydrophones will then be used to navigate the vehicle towards the general direction of the beacon. Once the direction has been established sonar will be used to verify the object’s location and navigate closer to it. As the submarine approaches the beacon the photo sensors will detect the flash. Then the camera will be activated to locate the ring’s position and orientation in order to collect it. Once the ring is recovered the AUV will surface. | 
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