Controlling Ocean One

Abstract

Using robots to explore venues that are beyond human reach has been a longstanding aspiration of scientists and expeditionists alike. The deep sea exemplifies such an unchartered environment that is currently inaccessible to humans. Ocean One (O${_2}$) is an anthropomorphic underwater robot, designed to operate in deep aquatic conditions and equipped with an array of sensor modalities. Central to the O${_2}$ concept is a human interface that connects the robot and human operator through haptics and vision. In this paper, we focus on O${_2}$’s control architecture and show how it enables an avatar-like synergy between the robot and human pilot. We establish functional autonomy by resolving kinematic and actuation redundancy, allowing the pilot to control O${_2}$ in a lower-dimensional space. We illustrate O${_2}$’s hierarchical whole-body control tasks including manipulation and posture tasks, feed-forward compensation as well as constraint handling. We also describe how to coordinate the dynamics of body and arms to achieve superior performance in contact and demonstrate O${_2}$’s capabilities in simulation, experiments in the pool as well as deployment to its archeological maiden mission to the ‘Lune’, a French naval vessel that sunk to 91 m depth in 1664 in the mediterranean sea.