To improve future tropical cyclone forecasts, researchers sent a remotely operated saildrone into the extreme winds and towering waves around the eye of a category 4 hurricane.
drones & AUVs
Drones Discover Hidden Weaknesses of Collapsing Volcanoes
Understanding buried, hidden zones of structural weaknesses within Indonesia’s Merapi volcano can help to substantially advance our ability to predict catastrophic dome failures.
Robotic Vehicles Explore World War II Era Ocean Battlefields
Project Recover used autonomous underwater vehicles to identify, access, and image hard-to-reach World War II wreckage sites near the Northern Mariana Islands.
Exploration and Evaluation of Deep-Sea Mining Sites
Two studies chart new territory for the fledgling deep-sea mining industry through advances in the identification and analysis of seafloor hydrothermal mounds.
A New Mayflower, Named for the Past, Autonomously Navigates the Future
To commemorate the 400th anniversary of the Pilgrims’ crossing, a ship guided by an AI captain will embark on the same journey, doing science along the way.
A Bright, LED-Lit Future for Ocean Sciences
LEDs have taken over the global lighting market. Now it’s time for this versatile, low-cost, and energy-efficient technology to illuminate oceanic processes.
Drones and Crowdsourced Science Aid Great Lakes Data Collection
Important data collection can aid coastal monitoring and management.
Drone Rules Make Tracking Down Faults a Difficult Feat
Regulations differ from country to country, but on one point, they’re relatively uniform: Drones must remain within their operators’ line of sight. How do earthquake scientists collect drone data while working within the rules?
Remote-Controlled Ocean Drones Observe Atmospheric Cold Pools
Novel uncrewed sailing vehicles measured properties of atmospheric cold pools in hard-to-reach regions of the central and eastern tropical Pacific Ocean.
A Reminder of a Desert’s Past, Before Dingo Removal
A fence spans Australia’s Strzelecki Desert, keeping dingoes out of the southern side. Drone and satellite technology have illustrated how removing this top predator changes vegetation growth.