The Underwater Recharge Docking System for an Autonomous Underwater Robot Applying Visual Information

This electronic document is a “live” template and already defines the components of your paper [title, text, heads, etc.] in its style sheet. The understanding of deep seabed should be addressed as the highest priority issue. Therefore Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology (JAMSTEC) has been constructing an integrated system in order to survey deep seabed in real time. On the other hand, JAMSTEC has being undertaken another system in order to survey seabed regularly for a long time. In this system, it is assumed that underwater robots survey the seabed autonomously and recharge the electric power wirelessly on the seabed from underwater recharge platforms. Therefore JAMSTEC is now modifying an existing autonomous underwater robot (AUV) as the testbed for this system. Also the first prototype of the underwater recharge platform (URP) has being developed. Since the AUV is required to dock autonomously with the URP, a navigation algorithm applying visual information has being designed. Now the utility and practicality of this system including the navigation algorithm has being verified in simulations and sea trials.