Ocean News & Technology Magazine said it best on their front cover : AUTONOMOUS UNDERWATER VEHICLES, PROVEN WORK HORSES FOR THE UNDERWATER INDUSTRY

We see, and we believe, that Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUV's) will soon be one of the most important sectors in the entire field of operations and research beneath the surface of our oceans and waterways. There is currently, and for the foreseeable future, a significant shortage of personnel trained in these areas, so when considering the need for education and training in the technology of the seas --- in the broadest sense --- our strongest recommendations would focus on these technologies.

Unmanned Underwater Vehicles (UUV's) include two sub-categories : An autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) is an underwater robot that can navigate on its own without any control or input by a human operator and  remotely operated underwater vehicles (ROVs) which are controlled and powered from the surface by a human, called variously the operator or the pilot, by means of electronic signals transmitted through the umbilical or using some other means of communication. In addition to the transmission of control signals, the umbilical also may transmit sensor and other recording data information back up to the surface .

History

The first AUV's were developed beginning in 1957, and was at that time designated as a "Special Purpose Underwater Research Vehicle", or SPURV, used in the study of submarine wakes . Russia and other countries were developing this technology at the time, although this University of Washington research was the first to be acknowledged publicly in the scientific literature. 

Applications

Until the technology became more fully developed, and that occurred fairly recently, the tasks assigned to AUVs were limited in number . Advanced sensor capabilities, an infrastructure of acceptance by users, and development of power supplies necessary for effective use have grown so that both civilian and military uses are being found for them.

Commercial

The major uses, and the ones most readily supported by the economics of the situation, are by the oil and gas industry. Before underwater drilling for oil and gas can begin, detailed purpose-built maps of the seafloor are required . The need for this highly specialized charting must exist before the company builds the very complex, heavy structures of their subsea infrastructure; pipelines and sub-sea installations are designed in the most cost effective manner with minimum disruption to the environment. The AUV can conduct precise surveys of areas where traditional bathymetric surveys would be not as effective or too expensive. AUV's also make it possible to conduct surveys after the pipe is laid.

Military

AUV's are typically used by the military services to map an area for mines, or to monitor a harbors for new unidentified objects. AUVs are also employed in anti-submarine warfare, to aid in the detection of manned submarines. 

Research

The University of South Florida has established a fair-sized oceanic research campus on the South end of St. Petersburg, Florida, as part of a significant marine science complex, which is, incidentally, just across the Sunshine Skyway Bridge from our home base. Indeed, the Editor of this Blog was a Program Assistant there when Admiral William (Bill) Behrens, the former Oceanographer of the Navy, was the Director of the Florida Institute of Oceanography there.

Scientists use AUVs to study lakes, the ocean, and the ocean floor. A variety of sensors can be affixed to AUVs to measure the concentration of various elements or compounds, the absorption or reflection of light, and the presence of microscopic life. Additionally, AUVs can be configured as tow-vehicles to deliver customized sensor packages to specific locations.

Hobby

Many roboticists construct AUVs as a hobby. There are several competitions in which AUVs constructed at home or in school projects can compete against each other.^[2][3][4] Like commercial AUV's, these robot subs can be fitted with cameras, lights, or sonar. Because of the limited resources of the school systems and the inexperience of the builders, hobbyist AUVs can rarely compete with commercial models on such parameters as operational depth, durability, or sophistication. Furthermore, hobby AUVs are usually not oceangoing, nor do they dive to any significant depth, usually operating in pools or lakes. A simple AUV can be constructed from microcontrollers, PVC pressure housing, relays, and other small parts obtainable in hobby shops or local hardware stores.^[5]

Vehicle designs

Hundreds of different AUVs have been designed over the past 50 or so years,^[10] but only a few companies sell vehicles in any significant numbers. There are about 10 companies that consistently sell AUV's internationally : Kongsberg Maritime, Hydroid (now owned by Kongsberg), Bluefin Robotics, Teledyne Gavia (formerly known as Hafmynd), and International Submarine Engineering (ISE) Ltd.

Vehicles range in size from lightweight AUVs that one man can lift to large diameter vehicles of over 32 feet (10 meters) in length. Large vehicle have advantages in terms of endurance and sensor payload capacity; smaller vehicles benefit significantly from lower logistics (for example: support vessel footprint; launch and recovery systems).

Some manufacturers have benefited from domestic government sponsorship including Bluefin and Kongsberg. The market is effectively split into three areas: scientific (including universities and research agencies), commercial offshore (oil and gas etc.) and military application (mine countermeasures, battle space preparation). The majority of these roles utilize a similar design and operate in a cruise (torpedo-type) mode. They collect data while following a preplanned route at speeds between 1 and 4 knots.

Commercially available AUVs include various designs such as the small REMUS 100 AUV that was developed originally by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and now produced commercially by Hydroid, Inc.; the larger HUGIN 1000 and 3000 AUVs were developed by Kongsberg Maritime and the Norwegian Defence Research Establishment; the Bluefin Robotics 12-and-21-inch-diameter (300 and 530 mm) vehicles and the International Submarine Engineering Ltd. Explorer. Most AUVs follow the traditional torpedo shape as this is seen as the best compromise between size, volume, hydrodynamic efficiency, and ease of transportation. Some vehicles are designed to make use of modular components which can be interchanged easily.

The market is changing so that designs are now following commercial requirements. Future designs include hover-capable AUVs for inspection and light-intervention (primarily for the offshore energy applications), and hybrid AUV/ROV designs that switch between roles as part of their mission profile. Commercial markets are, not surprisingly, driven by financial requirements, as the goal is to save money and expensive ship time.

While most current AUVs are capable of unsupervised missions, most operators remain within range of their operators so that they can maintain a close watch on these expensive, and in some cases classified, products. This is not always possible in Arctic environments when geopoliticaly-vital sea floor surveys are being made by the governments involved, such as when Canada recently used two ISE Explorer AUV's to survey the sea floor underneath the Arctic ice in support of their of sovereignty claims under the United Nations Convention of the Law of the Sea. Also, increasingly, very low-power, long-range variations such as underwater gliders can operate unattended for weeks or months in littoral and open ocean areas, relaying data by satellite to a base on shore, before returning to home base.

As of 2008, a new class of AUVs are being developed, the biomimetic (imitating nature) . Currently in experimental stages, these bionic vehicles can achieve high degrees of efficiency in propulsion and maneuverability by copying successful designs in nature. Two such vehicles are Festo's AquaJelly and Evologics' Bionik Manta.