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Stanford Built a Humanoid Submarine Robot To Explore a 17th-Century Shipwreck (ieee.org)

Posted by BeauHD on from the how-it's-made dept.

schwit1 quotes a report from IEEE Spectrum: Back in April, Stanford University professor Oussama Khatib led a team of researchers on an underwater archaeological expedition, 30 kilometers off the southern coast of France, to La Lune, King Louis XIV's sunken 17th-century flagship. Rather than dive to the site of the wreck 100 meters below the surface, which is a very bad idea for almost everyone, Khatib's team brought along a custom-made humanoid submarine robot called Ocean One. In this month's issue of IEEE Robotics and Automation Magazine, the Stanford researchers describe in detail how they designed and built the robot, a hybrid between a humanoid and an underwater remotely operated vehicle (ROV), and also how they managed to send it down to the resting place of La Lune, where it used its three-fingered hands to retrieve a vase. Most ocean-ready ROVs are boxy little submarines that might have an arm on them if you're lucky, but they're not really designed for the kind of fine manipulation that underwater archaeology demands. You could send down a human diver instead, but once you get past about 40 meters, things start to get both complicated and dangerous. Ocean One's humanoid design means that it's easy and intuitive for a human to remotely perform delicate archeological tasks through a telepresence interface.

schwit1 notes: "Ocean One is the best name they could come up with?"

24 of 47 comments (clear)

  1. Why always going for hominoid? by bruce_the_loon · · Score: 1

    This is just a dual arm AUV that they built the 3D camera mounts to look like a head.

    The same functionality can be done without making it look humanoid, so what is the attraction for manufacturers to do so? It probably adds extra cost to the project for no appreciable gain.

    --
    Trying to become famous by taking photos. Visit my homepage please.
    1. Re:Why always going for hominoid? by OpenSourced · · Score: 2

      It is explained. The reason was to facilitate the remote controlling by some kind of VR setup. If you turn your head, you expect something similar to happen to your robotic avatar. If you raise your arm, it's better if the distance between your "eyes" and your "shoulder", and the relationship of lengths of your "arms", is human-like. So you end up with a human-like structure. If you want to protect your sensors with a hull, a head-like cover is as good as any other.

      On the other side, there are many other alternatives open to you, and it's clear that they went for the hominoid look, but that's also very human :-)

      --
      Rome taught me patience and assiduous application to detail. Virtues which temper the boldness of great, general views.
    2. Re:Why always going for hominoid? by bruce_the_loon · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I got the technical reasoning for the arm design and the stereo cameras, but the head feels unnecessarily restrictive to me. It precludes the added utility of independently steerable cameras or adjusting the distance between cameras to get an exaggerated binocular vision which can be useful for certain retrieval and manipulation operations.

      I guess I always tend to think that humanoid robots are trying to do something the more difficult way than one that is built more along the functional requirements. Like using a three axis arm instead of a more flexible segmented snake that could reach into impossibly twisty gaps.

      --
      Trying to become famous by taking photos. Visit my homepage please.
    3. Re:Why always going for hominoid? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1
      If only they would provide some kind of citation or maybe just a simple pointer to an article that explains the choices they made and why. They built a robot that has a moveable, 3D camera, two articulated arms, and it has two pods on the back that can move to stabilize it. Seems like it has a humanoid shape, but yeah, all the expense they went to make the camera round was a huge waste of money.

      Almost forgot... it is totally awesome, and I want one. I want to read more about the control systems, though. Since it is near Christmas, I also want to learn what website all the tech minded, curious nerds went to, because they left /. RIP /.

    4. Re: Why always going for hominoid? by bsDaemon · · Score: 2

      Well, it seems to me it is designed to functional specs, where the PRD phase probably said something like "it should work like a person, but without risk of death" and then they went about figuring how to build that. Humans don't have snaky arms with additional articulation points, so how would someone in a VR motion capture suit control that?

  2. As Steve Jobs would say... by OpenSourced · · Score: 3, Informative

    Ocean One is the best name they could come up with?

    That's the kind of names that happens when you concentrate on the product, and not on the marketing of it.

    --
    Rome taught me patience and assiduous application to detail. Virtues which temper the boldness of great, general views.
  3. Next Slashdot poll by RuffMasterD · · Score: 2

    Clearly they are far too busy with trivial scientific details to bother with stuff that matters. Slashdot poll to the rescue: "What should Stanford call their new Humanoid Diving Robot?". I propose "Oussama bin Divn".

    --
    Human Rights, Article 12: Freedom from Interference with Privacy, Family, Home and Correspondence
    1. Re:Next Slashdot poll by Snard · · Score: 3, Funny

      I predict the top vote getter in the poll will be Botty McBotFace.

      --
      - Mike
  4. Stupid Comment by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    "schwit1 notes: "Ocean One is the best name they could come up with?""

    That was totally unnecessary and frankly a stupid observation to add.

  5. France again ? by mind_of_delusion · · Score: 1

    We are far too much into the splotlight lately on /.

  6. dangerous past 40 meters? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    > You could send down a human diver instead, but once you get past about 40 meters, things start to get both complicated and dangerous.

    Well for a scuba diver on oxygen, yes, but 100 meters would not be much of a problem for a diver using trimix. This statement is not quite true.

    1. Re: dangerous past 40 meters? by drewsup · · Score: 2

      Screw underwater salvage, this looks like a pretty good satellite repair bot, replace thrusters with gas jets, and operate from the ISS or xb37 with dedicated link.

    2. Re:dangerous past 40 meters? by demonlapin · · Score: 2

      Yeah, agreed. Recreational divers shouldn't be messing around at that depth, but technical divers do it all the time. Just have to have decompression facilities available.

    3. Re: dangerous past 40 meters? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Dunno, if you start having to breath a special air mix and have concerns about decompression, than I would definately say things are starting to get "complicated and dangerous" exactly as the article describes..... What qualifies as not starting to get complicated or dangerous in your mind?

    4. Re:dangerous past 40 meters? by ceoyoyo · · Score: 1

      Getting a bunch of grad students qualified on trimix, getting the equipment and breathing mix where you need it and making sure you've got decompression facilities available in case of an accident is complicated. In contrast, marine archeology at 30 m usually involves renting a dive boat and maybe sending some students to a recreation dive course (available in any city; mine cost $500) if they're not already qualified.

      Academics usually don't have quite the resources of corporations or navies.

    5. Re:dangerous past 40 meters? by DerekLyons · · Score: 1

      Yeah, agreed. Recreational divers shouldn't be messing around at that depth, but technical divers do it all the time. Just have to have decompression facilities available.

      However, those divers and all their support personnel and equipment are pretty pricey. I'd be willing to bet this robot is going to be much cheaper.

  7. Original reference by Ubi_NL · · Score: 1

    Some more background information that was posted by Stanford last April
    http://news.stanford.edu/2016/04/27/robotic-diver-recovers-treasures/.
    IMO contains most the the details in TFA mentioned here.

    --

    If an experiment works, something has gone wrong.
  8. They brought back more than a vase by Grand+Facade · · Score: 2

    The kind of money that it took for the expedition and the robot, they didn't bring back just a vase.

    They are just saying that while hiding the real loot behind their back.

    --
    Rick B.
    1. Re: They brought back more than a vase by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Well they really wanted the Heart of the Ocean but some bitch who had it all along threw it in the ocean when no-one was looking.

  9. A better name by not_surt · · Score: 2

    "Ocean 11" has a much nicer ring to it.

  10. Why thrusters? by tepples · · Score: 1

    The rear end of this vehicle is almost shaped like a mermaid tail. Any reason why it uses thrusters for propulsion and not, say, a fluke?

    1. Re:Why thrusters? by tepples · · Score: 1

      Animals need to conserve energy as well. Why didn't they evolve thrusters?

    2. Re:Why thrusters? by ceoyoyo · · Score: 1

      Nature doesn't have a single example of a macroscopic rotating propulsive structure (a wheel that's not microscopic). It seems to be something evolution has a hard time making. Coupling between the wheel and the rest of the organism would be tricky, among other things.

      Flukes on a submarine are a bad idea because it takes a lot of coordination and whole-body muscles to make it work, and it means that your head moves perpendicular to your direction of travel whenever you thrust.

  11. Size? by ItsJustAPseudonym · · Score: 1

    The article says it's about the size of a human, but it sure looks larger in the picture. (http://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/humanoids/stanford-ocean-one-humanoid-diving-robot)

    I suppose it's still an improvement over a larger ROV, but I wonder if there are hatches in ships that it cannot pass because of its size?