Remote-Controlled Robots Explore 'Lost City'

Roland Piquepaille writes "A large team of oceanographers is again exploring 'Lost City,' an hydrothermal vent field located in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, which was discovered in 2000 and named like this because of the myth of Atlantis. But this time, the oceanographers are not on a ship. Most of them are in a room at the University of Washington in Seattle. And according to this article from the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, they're using high-speed Internet connections to control robotic vehicles exploring the deep Atlantic Ocean thousands of miles away. Thanks to satellites, the remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) Argus and Hercules can transmit videos back to Seattle in real time. After analysis, the scientists can move the ROVs to specific areas of interest without having their feet wet. Read more for other details, references and pictures about this project."

Comments

Science, with clean hands

[ReformedExCon]

There was a quote that really struck me as odd and out of place in a science department.

quote
"This is how the science is going to be done," said Deborah Kelley, a University of Washington oceanographer. /quote

I can't believe that a scientist would forego the adventure and excitement of actually visiting and investigating on-site the things she wants to learn about. Robots and video cameras and sensors have their place, especially in areas where it is still impossible to go. However, replacing the actual experience of seeing these things firsthand, trading that for lily-white labcoats and sterile research labs is the opposite direction scientists should be heading, in my opinion.

I, for one, would rather head down to the depths of the ocean or fly to the next planet personally than have some robot do that in my place, if I had the choice.

Re:Science, with clean hands

[jericho4.0]

Robots are cheaper, safer, and expendable. I hope that no deep sea researcher ever misses out on going to the bottom a few times, but that same reseacher can get 100 times the work done useing robots.

It's the same for space travel. Just because it's romantic to have humans in space, doesn't mean it's a good idea to blow 90% of our space budget on LEO manned 'missions'.

Re:Science, with clean hands

[ReformedExCon]

I am not sure I can agree with your position, though I agree with your sentiment. I don't think I implied that robots ought to be shunned in favor of sending humans to do a job. Robots indeed have their place, as do computers, calculators, and every other technology that makes exploring and researching more fruitful. But I do not think that technology is the be-all and end-all in science. It may be helpful to overcome barriers, but at the core it is humans who must make the final fateful decisions. And a human who is on-site can make a better snap decision than one who is away in a laboratory staring at a video monitor with a 3 second delay between his commands and the robot's actions.

I understand your unwillingness to want to pay for such "extravagancies". Just as you don't want to pad some scientist's budget, I perhaps do not want to pad some artist's funding. However, a government that works best is one that helps the society it governs progress with as little human suffering as possible and at the lowest cost to its citizens. As such, I have to think that it would be far more proper to have informed people making the decision as to how to spend allocated funds rather than trusting each citizen to specifically designate where each penny of their taxes goes. Universities have a much better perspective than the common layperson when it comes to scientific research, and I think it ought to be they who make the decision as to how to spend allocated government funds.

Science is absolutely about adventure and excitement. It is the excitement of discovering something new, of finding something that no one has ever found before, of creating something that no one has ever created before. Science is about getting "out there" and finding stuff. It sustains itself with people who are excited about finding stuff. You can't take that away and give it to the robots and expect to have scientists lining up to fill the labs forever.

Re:Science, with clean hands

[JanneM]

In this case, what's the difference, really? If you go "there" in person, you're still looking out through a thick glass window (or, more likely, at a monitor), and manipulating the world around you with buttons, joysticks and other remote controls.

The difference really is, when you're there in person you're only in control of one (large, cumbersome) exploring unit, you can explore for a lot shorter time (since so much resources is spent on keeping you alive), and you waste hours just traveling down, then up again. Oh, and due to safety reasons and a far larger, more fragile craft, you won't be able to take the same risks or all the same observations you can remotely.

Much of science hasn't been "hands on" for years or decades. Mostly, it's not a loss. It may be romantic to freeze your ass off on some mountain top with a telescope, but there is again little point when all your observations and data analysis is done off-site anyway. And it's not only in exploratory science either; just check out the state of automation in a chemistry lab today. Then check out the life expectancy of an experimental organic chemist and you'll see a reason automation is a good thing.

Re:Science, with clean hands

[Locke2005]

You have obviously never actually experienced a 7 hour commute to the ocean floor to do a few hours work, followed by a 48 hour decompression period. And by the way, given that the pressure is several atmosheres, you're pretty much forced to do everything by remote control anyway, even if your are in a sub! Given a choice of sitting around 80% of the time doing nothing, or working by remote control, I think I would choose remote control. Unless, of course, we're exploring the Dallas Cheerleaders' locker room... some things you just have to do by hand!

Re:not real time

[JanneM]

The critical parameter is "upper limit". Hard real-time systems are fairly slow; what they have is that they _guarantee_ a response within some time limit. Every time. Soft real-time systems would typically have one limit stating the maximum allowable average response rate, and a second, higher limit stating the maximum allowable ever. "real time" implies that the system won't let the world "get ahead"; things will not get queued further and further afield without limit.

Nothing in the concept of "real-time" does it say the response has to be fast. Consistent, yes, but not fast. If you have a system guaranteeing a response within ten seconds, every time, that is real-time.

Re:go UW

[Danger Stevens]

Seriously, the UW has some bragging rights. The 'Cyclotron Shop' in north campus boasts the most powerful electromagnet on the west coast. It's powerful enough that one of the standard physics projects is to watch it levitate frogs in midair.

Glad to see they keep trying new things.

Re:I just ate some fried chicken.

[sexybomber]

What the FUCK? Where did that come from?

The cold war actually benefitted subs more

[ianscot]

I'm one of the few people it seems that feels there is more information to be learned from our own vastly uncharted seas than far reaches of space.

Is that you, Timothy Dalton? Are you still reading from the narrative script for "Deep Blue"?

Don't fret too much. The military's been lavishing huge money (example: Glomar Explorer) on the ocean for the entirety of the cold war. Now that we've won that war (and are fighting its non-oceanic dregs and ghosts in the form of OBL, Saddam H. and so on) the potential civilian and scientific uses of all that technology are getting tried out in a big way. Robert Ballard's Mediterranean shipwreck dives were done with the little Navy submersibles, for one example among a whole lot of them. The Russian mini subs are available for hire, and so on.

This is a sort of golden age for shipwrecks and deep sea exploration. It's happening, and there's a lot of cross-benefits between space and the ocean. To wit: this story, or the MBARI cabled submersibles that Bruce Robison uses, juxtaposed with the Mars rovers. Benthic exploratino faces some of the same choices space exploration does. (Do we need to send people down to the Challenger Deep, or remote vehicles?)

These aren't mutually exclusive options at all.