Optimizing Endurance of an Autonomous Vertical Profiler (AVP)

Autonomous Vertical Profiler (AVP) being one of the Unmanned Underwater Vehicles has been primarily designed and developed to observe the properties of the ocean such as variation of salinity, temperature, conductivity or dissolved oxygen along a predetermined depth profile. In the last decade, substantial modifications have been introduced in the design of the AVP to enhance its endurance and durability. This paper illustrates a novel strategy that can improve and control the performance of AVP in terms of endurance through controller modeling. Taking advantage of pseudo-dynamic models of the vehicle, environment, and the electronic systems, better endurance control has been achieved. The maximum number of dives and the power consumption is controlled with the aid of integrated pseudo-mathematical models and neural networks. The endurance controller has been simulated in MATLAB.