Contactless data transfer for autonomous underwater vehicle docking station

Due to the water’s characteristics, especially salt water, electromagnetic fields are quickly dissipated and absorbed in underwater environment. Thus, to transfer data in this medium, acoustic signals are mostly used due to their capability to transmit data over a long range. However, at very short range, electromagnetic signals enable high rate wireless data transfer in the underwater medium. The objective of this paper is to investigate underwater contactless data transfer technologies between an Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV) and its docking station. On one hand, we consider 5 GHz Wi-Fi based transmission prototype and provide experimental end-to-end data performance for several transmission range, rotation angles, non-perfect alignment and transmit power. On the other hand we investigate the achievable rate of an experimental Magnetic Induction (MI) prototype performing contactless power and data transfer.