We have created an autonomous, biomimetic robotic fish that closely follows both the shape and motion of real animals. We hope to investigate the efficiency of this motion in order to create underwater robot swarms which require less power to operate and can be both cheaper and simpler to produce.
The Aurora SCOPE project is part of a Phase II Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grant from the Office of Naval Research that is held by Aurora Flight Sciences. The project focused on creating a physical demonstration of Aurora’s Onboard Planning Module (OPM). The OPM serves to coordinate missions between multiple autonomous vehicles. The final demonstration involved the coordination of three unmanned surface vehicles on a target identification and tracking mission. The Aurora SCOPE team supplied two of the vehicles for this demonstration. The targets were identified and tracked using a sensor package determined by the research of the students of the team. The sensor package chosen consisted of a 180 degree LIDAR and a camera vision system.