Robot Submarine Poisons Sea Stars To Save Coral Reefs

schwit1 writes: A 30-kilogram robotic yellow submarine is keeping sea stars in check with poison. The sea stars periodically have huge population booms, and a square kilometer of reef can be home to 100,000 of them. They'll kill off the reefs if left unchecked, but humans can only kill a couple sea stars per minute. The task is overwhelming but simple and repetitive, and thus ripe for automation. The COTSBot has "a maximum speed of over two meters per second and an endurance of over six hours. Five thrusters give it the capability of briefly hovering in the water column, giving it time to attack crown of thorns sea stars with an integrated poison injection system. It's completely autonomous, down to the identification and targeting of [sea stars] lurking among coral."

Comments

First they came for the sea stars...

[Anonymous Coward]

First they came for the sea stars, but I said nothing...

SeaNet Prototype

[cold fjord]

Prototype terminator version 0.001 in testing.

Let's hope "SeaNet" doesn't become self-aware.

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Interesting use of technology, I hope it works well. This sort of thing might be a useful way to address the growing problem of invasive species, many of which are aquatic. It seems to be a preferable means of addressing the issue instead of trying to introduce more predator species in an attempt to control an invasive species.

If it doesn't it should carry a "body cam" to review the kills to ensure is it working properly and not killing things it shouldn't.