Miscellaneous

For many the oceans are still a black box, a place where monstrous creatures still inhabit deep crevaces, where fish stocks are thought to be plentiful and endless. An immensity with no limits that can take all of the abuse we can throw at it. Our knowledge of the oceans has grown rapidly in the last decades with technological advances in robotics and electronics, pushing the research and allowing us to explore further and deeper into it. In this six part series we will bring everyone up to speed and delve on some of the most advanced tools that are instrumenting our oceans.

Documentary film series: 6 x 26'

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Since 1993, members of the BentProp Project have hunted the seas of Palau for American planes shot down in by the Japanese during World War II. Now they have new high-tech oceanographic tools to help in the search.

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Cite de la Mer in Cherbourg, France, uses some special tools in their Great Gallery of Men and Machines to help spell out Happy Birthday for Alvin.

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A little meta-documentary about our year and a half voyage to create "Atlantic Crossing: A Robot's Daring Mission," a film about a team of Rutgers oceanographers hoping to "sail" an the first autonomous underwater vehicle across the Atlantic. The collaboration between the two departments laid the foundation for what is now the Rutgers Center for Digital Filmmaking.

Created in 2010.

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Earth’s oceans cover more than 70% of our planet’s surface and constitute more than 95% of its biosphere. The ocean provides more than 50% of the oxygen we breathe, is a major driver of weather and climate, and is the source of food, energy, and cancer-fighting chemicals. Yet more than 95% of the world’s oceans remain unexplored. Ocean exploration and undersea research are changing, with an emphasis on more autonomous sampling and data collection and fewer opportunities for field-based experiences. Telepresence and robotics are currently complementing “manned” ocean exploration, but innovations in undersea technology will be required to increase the pace, scope, and efficiency of ocean exploration and to transform the way we explore.

Biography

Dr. Shirley Pomponi is Research Professor and Executive Director of the NOAA Cooperative Institute for Ocean Exploration, Research, and Technology at Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute, Florida Atlantic University, in Fort Pierce, Florida, Professor of Marine Biotechnology in the Bioprocess Engineering Group at Wageningen University, Netherlands, and Adjunct Scientist at Mote Marine Laboratory in Sarasota. She received her Ph.D. in Biological Oceanography from the University of Miami. Her research focuses on marine biotechnology, in general, and sponge systematics, cell and molecular biology, in particular. She has authored or co-authored more than 100 peer-reviewed scientific publications and is co-inventor on several patents. She represents FAU on and actively participates in the National and Southern Associations of Marine Laboratories and the Florida Institute of Oceanography. She recently co-chaired a National Academy of Sciences study, requested by the National Science Foundation: “Sea Change: 2015-2025 Decadal Survey of Ocean Sciences”.

Dr. William J. Clancey, a senior research scientist at IHMC, is a computer scientist whose research relates cognitive and social science in the study of work practices and the design of agent systems. He received a Ph.D. in Computer Science at Stanford University in 1979 after graduating Summa Cum Laude in Mathematical Sciences (BA) from Rice University in 1974. He joined the MYCIN Project in 1975 in Stanford’s Knowledge Systems Lab where he developed some of the earliest AI programs for explanation, meta-level reasoning, the critiquing method of consultation, tutorial discourse, and student modeling. Dr. Clancey’s work on “heuristic classification” and “model construction operators” has been influential in the design of expert systems and instructional programs.

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Matthew Johnson-Roberson
Assistant Professor, University of Michigan

Abstract
Robust, scalable Simultaneous Localization and Mapping (SLAM) algorithms support the successful deployment of robots in many real-world applications. Robotic platforms now deliver vast amounts of sensor data from large unstructured environments. In attempting to process and interpret this data, the underwater domain poses many unique challenges. This talk will present recent advances in perception techniques for the generation of 3D reconstructions over tens of thousands of square meters. Topics will include the generation of self-consistent poses, long-term localization, consistency of lighting through an attenuating medium, the visualization of gigapixel textured models using a novel state-of-the-art rendering system, and a crowd sourcing platform using smartphones and tablets to aid in the processing of vast volumes of visual data. The outputs of the proposed techniques will be displayed in real world applications including underwater archeology and marine science. This talk will show results from the monitoring of Australia’s Coral Reefs and the archeological mapping of a 5,000 year-old submerged city. Finally, the talk will look forward towards new work in underwater grasping and manipulation and a proposal for drastic cost reduction in deep water monitoring approaches.

Speaker Biography
Matthew Johnson-Roberson is Assistant Professor of Engineering in the Department of Naval Architecture & Marine Engineering and the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at the University of Michigan. He received a PhD from the University of Sydney in 2010. There he worked on Autonomous Underwater Vehicles for long-term environment monitoring. Upon joining the University of Michigan faculty in 2013, he created the DROP (Deep Robot Optical Perception) Lab, which researches a wide variety of perception problems in robotics including SLAM, 3D reconstruction, scene understanding, data mining, and visualization. He has held prior postdoctoral appointments with the Centre for Autonomous Systems - CAS at KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm and the Australian Centre for Field Robotics at the University of Sydney. He is a recipient of the NSF CAREER award (2015).

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Abstract
Underwater robotics is undergoing a transformation. Advances in AI and machine learning are enabling a new generation of underwater robots to make intelligent decisions (where to sample? how to navigate?) by reasoning about their environment (what is the shipping and water forecast?). At USC, we are engaged in a long-term effort to explore ideas and develop algorithms that will lead to persistent, autonomous underwater robots. In this talk, I will discuss some of our recent results focusing on two problems in adaptive sampling: underwater change detection and biological sampling. Time permitting; I will also present recent work on hazard avoidance, allowing underwater robots to operate in regions where there is substantial ship traffic.

Speaker Biography
Gaurav S. Sukhatme is Dean’s Professor of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering at the University of Southern California (USC). He currently serves as the Chairman of the Computer Science department. His research is in networked robots with applications to aquatic robots and on-body networks. Sukhatme has published extensively in these areas and served as PI on numerous federal grants. He is Fellow of the IEEE and a recipient of the NSF CAREER award and the Okawa foundation research award. He is one of the founders of the RSS conference, serves on the RSS Foundation Board, and has served as program chair of three major robotics conferences (ICRA, IROS and RSS). He is the Editor-in-Chief of the Springer journal Autonomous Robots.

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CHIMAERA MATE ROV Remotely Operated Underwater Vehicle

Giuliano Grahl, Rudnei Moran, Daniel Pena, Julian Sellan
Advisor: Dr. Sabri Tosunoglu
Department of Mechanical and Materials Engineering
Florida International University
Miami, Florida

Entry to the Robot Showcase component of FCRAR 2016 (Florida Conference on Recent Advances in Robotics) by FIU.

FCRAR 2016 was held at FIU in Miami, Florida, on May 12-13, 2016.

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Getty photographers are using underwater robotic cameras to capture the perfect shot in the 2016 Rio Olympics.

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This is Ricardo Tellez, from The Construct.

Today, I would like to dedicate the podcast to the people who is already thinking about the summer holidays. Going to the beach, having sun, drinking something cold... and your robot playing in the water!

And today, it is my pleasure to introduce you Nils Bore. Nils is postdoc at the DIVISION OF ROBOTICS, PERCEPTION AND LEARNING of the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm where he is developing underwater vehicles within the SMaRC project. Nils is here today to tell us more about how to develop ROS-based autonomous underwater vehicles.

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Fast food delivery man Rob Doyle doesn't just drive up to a front door and knock. He straps on scuba gear and dives deep to deliver pie to a hotel under the sea.

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A team of engineers from MIT developed a navigational method for autonomous vehicles to navigate accurately in the Arctic Ocean without GPS. The technology was demonstrated during a U.S. Navy Arctic Exercise in collaboration with Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, and General Dynamics Mission Systems using a Bluefin®-21 UUV.

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