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duce weight and enhance performance. ing a system that could hold its position

Fiber Optic Rotary Joints are a means at sea—even if it wasn’t anchored in to pass signals across rotating inter- place—and operate 24/7 without harm- faces, particularly when transmitting ing the environment. The result was large amounts of data. Ruggedized for the Wave Glider, a surface robot that is harsh environments, compact sizes and powered by wave and solar energy. The a variety of custom con? guration op- company has received many prestigious tions. Fluid Rotary Unions are currently innovation awards. The most notable used around the world to ensure reliable are: The World Economic Forum Tech-

MRV Systems transmission of life support, process, nology Pioneer, The Economist Ocean power and control ? uids. Condition Innovation Challenge Inaugural Winner,

MRV Systems

Monitoring solutions reduce operat- MTR Top 100 and the Guinness World

San Diego, CA, USA ing costs using optical monitoring and Record for the “the longest journey of http://www.mrvsys.com slip ring sensors to enable preventative an autonomous, unmanned surface ve- maintenance. hicle on the planet.” In 2016, it joined MRV Systems provides pro? ling ? oats

The Boeing Company. The Wave Glider and autonomous underwater vehicles

Liquid Robotics is composed of the ? oat and a sub with to make high-quality measurements of

Sunnyvale, CA, USA wings. Connected by 8-meter tether, the physical properties of the ocean. MRV https://www.liquid-robotics.com ? oat is on the surface of the ocean where products cover from the surface to conditions are the harshest with the sub 6,000m. Some are specially designed

Liquid Robotics makes the Wave Glider, below where it is calm. It converts the for ease of air deployment. All are de- an autonomous ocean surface robot used up and down motion of the waves into signed to be low-cost and high-endur- to enable long duration observation and forward thrust. Solar energy powers the ance, to enable ef? cient exploration of monitoring. The Wave Glider enables on-board computing, communications, the oceans, particularly in areas where real-time data collection and communi- navigation and sensor payloads. observations by traditional methods cations from the sea? oor-to-space. Wave Glider advantages include: are not practical. MRV was founded

Liquid Robotics was born out of a pas- • No dependency on fossil fuels, in 2010, as a spin-off from the Scripps sion for the ocean. In 2005, it set out with • 24/7 long-duration operations,

Institution of Oceanography, with a li- the simple goal of recording humpback • Station keeping for up to 12 months, cense to manufacture the SOLO II pro- whale songs off the coast of Hawaii. • Open & Extendable Platform: Add ? ling ? oat. Since then, MRV has re? ned

Founder Roger Hine went about design- new sensors and software capabilities.

the original SOLO II design to the MRV

S2-A, and expanded its product line to include an ‘A’-size pro? ling ? oat, the Air Launched Autonomous Micro-

Observer (ALAMO). MRV’s ? agship product is the S2-A, a re? nement of the

SOLO II design originally licensed from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography.

The S2-A is a buoyancy-driven vertical pro? ler, capable of operating to 2,000m depth. It typically carries a Conductiv- ity-Temperature-Depth sensor to obtain vertical pro? les from 2,000m to near the surface. To meet the needs of more rigorous environmental deployment conditions, MRV developed, built, and deployed a smaller vertically pro? ling ? oat. The ALAMO is an ‘A’-sized air- deployable pro? ling ? oat meant to pro- vide the same performance as the MRV

S2-A, but in a smaller package. The AL-

AMO has been successfully launched each year to date since the 2014 hurri- Liquid Robotics cane season.

July/August 2017

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