Teecht. Edifice The Future, I Roboboat At A Time

By Sierra Jones, Office of Naval Research

ARLINGTON, Va. -- Teams of students from xiii schools representing 6 countries tested their applied scientific discipline skills yesteryear deploying autonomous boats during the 11th annual International RoboBoat Competition, held June 18-24 inward Daytona Beach, Florida.

Sponsored yesteryear the Office of Naval Research as well as the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International Foundation, RoboBoat is an annual robotics competitor inward which the side yesteryear side generation of engineers puts autonomous surface vehicles through a serial of advanced water-based challenges that mirror real-world maritime operations.

“The challenges powerfulness seem simplistic, only earlier the boats fifty-fifty larn far to the H2O to seek as well as consummate the course, there’s a lot complex applied scientific discipline that goes into the ASVs’ development,” said Kelly Cooper, a plan officeholder inward ONR’s Ship Systems as well as Engineering Research Division as well as a RoboBoat judge. “This competitor actually showcases the technical ingenuity of the students.”

Transforming Logistics, Warfare

That ingenuity volition live on needed equally the wish for autonomous systems continues to grow -- non solely for the naval service, only across the commercial sector, equally companies such equally Dominos, Amazon as well as Uber all wish to role autonomous vehicles for deliveries.

And piece these companies are making strides toward autonomous services for the average consumer, the Navy is looking to role the engineering to “create telephone commutation shifts” inward the agency the Navy as well as Marine Corps acquit futurity naval operations.

According to the lately released Navy Strategic Roadmap for Unmanned Systems, the destination is to “transform modern warfare” yesteryear seamlessly integrating unmanned systems into the naval services as well as across all domains.

This is something that ONR is already doing -- pushing the path frontward for autonomous technologies such equally swarming boats, aerial vehicles as well as unmanned surface ships as well as helicopters.

“RoboBoat showcases the talents of futurity engineers as well as serves equally a basic introduction to roughly of what the Navy needs its autonomous systems to do,” Cooper said. “We know in that place volition live on a rigid line from the commercial sector to choose these kids come upwards run for them, only nosotros wish the participants to know that the futurity is brilliant amongst the naval services equally good -- nosotros choose the jobs as well as nosotros demand their talent, too.”

Competition

As inward the past, this year’s teams, largely composed of academy students, were evaluated on their vessel pattern as well as performance. The pattern constituent focused on innovation, character of applied scientific discipline as well as craftsmanship. The performance constituent tested a vehicle’s powerfulness to execute specific missions on the H2O without whatever human interaction.

As share of the performance challenge, the ASVs had to demonstrate their speed as well as navigation capabilities yesteryear passing through a laid of gates earlier competing for whatever mission challenge points.

The mission tasks demonstrated the maritime systems’ autonomous deportment inward unlike scenarios, including: speed; automated docking, which demonstrated the powerfulness to launch as well as communicate amongst an aerial drone; finding a path inward a crowded area; target identification; precise navigation; and, finally, provide to dock.

Indonesia’s Institut Teknologi Sepuluh Nopember was this year’s biggest winner, bringing habitation the top prize of $6,000. Georgia Institute of Technology won minute prize as well as $5,000; Florida’s Hagerty High School took 3rd as well as $3,000; as well as the squad from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University’s Florida campus came inward fourth, earning $2,000.

Smaller awards of $500 as well as $1,000 inward diverse particular abide by categories went to Washington’s Nathan Hale High School, Mexico’s Tecnologico de Monterrey, Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, India’s SRM Institute of , the Netherlands’ Delft University of Technology as well as Hagerty High School.

The other participating institutions were Florida Atlantic University, Indonesia’s Universitas Diponegoro, University of Iowa, University of Michigan as well as Canada’s University of Ottawa.