Kraken real time Sonar deployed on US Navy AUV
Friday, Jan 12, 2018
Kraken Robotics Inc. announced on 11 January 2018, that its
wholly-owned subsidiary, Kraken Robotic Systems Inc., has completed
development of a real-time Synthetic Aperture Sonar (“SAS”) system that
has been successfully integrated and tested onboard a US Navy REMUS 600
Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV) operated by the Naval Undersea
Warfare Center in Rhode Island.
“Kraken is proud to have
developed an AUV solution for real-time, ultra high-resolution imaging
and 3D mapping of the seafloor,” said Karl Kenny, Kraken’s President and
CEO. “We expect this technology will revolutionize the way in which big
data from Synthetic Aperture Sonar imagery and bathymetry is processed.
We would like to extend our thanks and appreciation to our colleagues
at the Naval Undersea Warfare Center for their support in deployment and
testing of our solution on their REMUS 600 AUV.”
At least 5cm of
target pixel resolution is required for effective minehunting. This
can be achieved with Synthetic Aperture Sonar (SAS) to ranges of over
250 metres. While conventional side scan sonars can also achieve this
resolution, they can only do so at very short range, typically limited
to less than 25 metres. This range limitation has a direct effect on
search times and results in very inefficient area coverage rates.
Synthetic
Aperture Sonar can provide up to 10 times the range and area coverage
rates of conventional side scan sonar. SAS is particularly well suited
for AUVs and industry experts predict that SAS will replace conventional
side scan sonars for many military applications. SAS technology also
has significant potential in other underwater imaging applications
including offshore energy, seabed surveying, marine archaeology, debris
mapping and search and salvage operations.
Mr. Kenny went on to
say, “The major concern of mine countermeasures is to keep sailors far
away from the mine threat while having a high level of confidence in the
detection and classification of possible threats. Real-time SAS signal
processing onboard an AUV is a significant step forward from the current
approach. Kraken’s real-time SAS can increase safety, improve
operational efficiency, reduce the mission risk of missing mines and
significantly reduce and/or eliminate post mission analysis time.”
For more information, please visit:
http://krakenrobotics.com