Page 36: of Marine Technology Magazine (January 2022)

SUBSEA VEHICLES WHOI ORPHEUS ork by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory use by the Mars rover and Ingenuity, its robot helicopter col- (JPL), developed for exploring Mars, is now league. It may sound like science ? ction, but it’s fast becoming being leveraged by Woods Hole Oceano- science fact and the potential impact of successful exploration

W graphic Institution (WHOI) to help tap Earth’s in both areas could also have huge ripple effects, says Tim deepest water secrets. In turn, WHOI’s work will help NASA Shank, Associate Scientist and deep-sea biologist at WHOI. explore oceans on other worlds in our solar system.

Central to the two missions is the deployment of underwater ORPHEUS – AN AUV FOR THE UNDERWORLD technology, low power miniaturized sensors and terrain-based Spearheading WHOI’s Orpheus development over the last navigation. For WHOI’s part, it’s developing a low-cost, full ? ve years has been Shank and Casey Machado, operations ocean depth autonomous underwater vehicle platform (AUV), manager at WHOI’s Autonomous Vehicle and Sensor Technol-

Orpheus, and a miniaturized chemical sensing, while JPL is ogy (AVAST) facility (a kind of technology acceleration hub giving Orpheus the ability to navigate, using image-based ter- at WHOI where anyone with ideas can get help to test them rain relative navigation (TRN) – technology developed for out). Key to Orpheus’ design is for it to be compact and cost 36 January/February 2022

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