Abstract

The human spirit to explore is the driving force behind this project. Remotely
operated vehicles (ROVs) are often used to observe environments hostile to humans.
ROVs are restricted by their requirement to be controlled by humans, which adds
limitations to distance and time.

The goal of this project is to create an autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) to

compete in the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International (AUVSI)
RoboSub competition in San Diego, CA, as well as the National Underwater Robotics
Challenge (NURC) in Phoenix, AZ. Mechanically, the vehicle requirements include
waterproofing, material selection, propulsion, actuators, CAD, and fabrication.
Electronically, the AUV will need a passive sonar system to detect a 22-30kHz pinger
source from up to 100 feet, an on-board power system, additional sensors such as an
IMU, and the computer system.

The system will require machine vision, artificial intelligence, and tactics for
redundancy and verification.