Oceans and inland waters play an important role in renewable energy and sustainable food production. The associated underwater infrastructure, including offshore wind farms, aquaculture facilities, pipelines, and quay walls, requires reliable inspection and maintenance. Despite the risks, human divers are still widely used for such operations. Large-scale working-class Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROVs) offer a safer alternative, especially in hazardous conditions. However, they come with significant operational challenges. ROVs require skilled operators and high-cost infrastructure, i.e. vessels.
Therefore, autonomous underwater manipulation constitutes an important milestone within the field of underwater robotics.
In addition to conventional rigid manipulators, soft robotic manipulators offer new opportunities for interacting with fragile structures, sensitive environments, and objects whose properties may not be known in advance. Their inherent compliance can enable safer and more adaptable physical interaction underwater.
Small-scale Systems
Underwater vehicle–manipulator systems (UVMSs) have been the subject of research for decades. However, most previous work has focused on large-scale, heavy robotic systems. Recent advances in miniaturization have enabled a new class of small-scale and lightweight UVMSs. In particular, low-cost and widely available commercial platforms, such as the BlueROV2 and the Reach Alpha 5 manipulator, have lowered the entry barrier to underwater manipulation research. Their compact size and accessibility facilitate the development and experimental validation of new approaches.
Within this emerging field, our research focuses on the development and control of small-scale underwater vehicle–manipulator systems. We investigate both conventional rigid manipulators and soft robotic concepts, ranging from system design and integration to modeling, sensing, and control.
