Design and Implementation of WAL-SEA, a Multifunctional Remotely Operated Vehicle for the Study of Near-Shore Ocean Ecosystems

88.3 % of the giant kelp forests along California coastlines have been devoured by the overpopulated purple sea urchins, and the current manual solution of relying on specially trained divers to reduce urchin numbers is laborious and inefficient, along with the inherent risks with diving. There is an urgent need to develop an ROV system to study near-shore ocean ecosystems. This research was carried out to design, implement, and test a new underwater near-shore ROV named WAL-SEA which integrated survey and vacuum modules for near-shore research for the first time. WAL-SEA consists of two major modules: a survey and a vacuum module. The survey module collected footage data on a target area, the information from which was utilized to collect specimens using the vacuum module. Seven experimental trials at Tanker's Reef, Monterey, California up to 60 feet deep were conducted to optimize the WAL-SEA system. The results showed that it surveyed a target area at least 10 times faster than a well-trained diver and culled overpopulated species 6 times more efficiently than the current manual approach of having divers perform pre-surveying and culling. This result is the first demonstration of an integrated vacuum module with an ROV system traditionally used for surveying. WAL-SEA can be applied immediately to applications such as reducing overpopulated organisms, tracking migration patterns of underwater species, monitoring restoration of endangered organisms, and cleaning invasive species.