Using Neuro–Evolutionary Techniques to Tune Odometric Navigational System of Small Biomimetic Autonomous Underwater Vehicle – Preliminary Report

Abstract

Abstract Autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) are robots that operate in underwater environment and do not need involvement of an operator when performing some tasks. In order to move independently in water environment, AUVs need navigation capabilities, on the one hand, they have to be able to detect obstacles and avoid them, and on the other hand, they also have to know their own position and spatial orientation, at least course. With regard to the orientation, there are many various solutions like inertial systems, inclinometers, magnetic compasses, optical gyro–compasses, whereas, position due to unavailability of GPS requires solutions dedicated to underwater environment such as inertial navigation. To this end, information about spatial orientation and velocity is necessary. When the vehicle is not equipped with a device to measure velocity, e.g. because of small size of the vehicle itself, the only solution is to use odometry, that is, to apply information from the drive to estimate the velocity. The paper presents Odometric Navigational System (ONS) designed for a small biomimetic autonomous underwater vehicle (BAUV) and tuned by means of neuro–evolutionary techniques. To verify system performance, data from the real BAUV were applied.