Oct 8 2010
Michael Jenkin, Professor in York’s Faculty of Science & Engineering and his research team at the York’s Center for Vision Research, have developed an AquaTable archetype a water-resistant controller that performs wireless monitoring of the AQUA robot.
The AQUA robot was developed by a combined research team from McGill, York and Dalhousie Universities. This robot is tiny, agile and by means of its paddles it can swim underwater for gathering complex data from reefs and sunken ships. Divers can program the AquaTable for exhibiting two dimensional tags on its screen which is analogous to the bar codes identified by smart phones. The in-built camera of the AQUA robot will interpret these tags and then perform the desired tasks.
AQUATablet Robot
By developing this wireless controller, the researchers have overcome a major challenge of eliminating the wires on the marine robot. Also the conventional wire-free method of communication though a modem is disturbed due to the interference of radio waves with water.
Michael Jenkin has stated that the tethered means of communication between the diver, robot, and surface operator is quite ambiguous and while investigating an intricate operation like shipwreck, the robot and the diver have to react instantaneously to any environmental variations. He added that any deviation in communication could be risky.
The AquaTable features toggle switches and on-screen prompts and the entire controller is protected by an aluminum casing along with an acrylic covering. Earlier, laminated flashcards were utilized by the divers for communicating with the underwater robots which can profoundly restrict the person to offer only a predetermined series of commands.
It was reported that this research work will be demonstrated at the IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS) which will be held in Taiwan.