Equipment for horizontal displacements
The MARMOR project will propose a new concept to measure vertical displacements on the order of cm’s which, compared to experiments with large oceanographic vessels, allows :
- acoustic noise reduction;
- improvement of acoustic emission center;
- GNSS positioning and costs reduction of GNSS/A experiment.
The MARMOR concept is based on the acquisition of the following equipment:
- One USV, to collect multi-parameter measurements for coastline studies and acoustic communication with seafloor sensors.
- One integrated USBL-Inertial-GNSS device to link the underwater acoustic measurements to GNSS satellites
- Eight (at least) acoustic beacons at the sea-surface to allow absolute positioning at the sub-centimeter level in a global reference frame through combination with GNSS.
The project also aims to achieve a well thought-out and coordinated fleet of drones on a national scale. The development phase is ongoing and it is essential to identify a maximum number of scenarios while maintaining this notion of compromise between science, environmental constraints, logistics and finance. A tender will be launched in 2023. The flotilla, the MARMOR flagship drone and the FOF drone are expected to be available in 2023-2024.
In July 2022 a workshop on Experimentation and instrumentation took place in Montpellier. 2 posters on the development of marine drones for oceanographic research was presented and can be found below:
Development of underwater drones for oceanographic research poster 1
Development of underwater drones for oceanographic research poster 2
More information about PAMELI can be found here