Descrizione del progetto
Ascoltare per una migliore visione di ciò che c’è sott’acqua
Robot intelligenti dotati di videocamere vengono utilizzati per esplorare le profondità dell’oceano e per condurre ispezioni in condizioni imprevedibili sotto la superficie dell’acqua. Tuttavia, la raccolta di immagini con una videocamera in ambienti con condizioni di scarsa visibilità nell’acqua è un problema. Il progetto SOUNDTILES, finanziato dall’UE, ha trovato una soluzione utilizzando una nuova generazione di telecamere acustiche in grado di fornire direttamente immagini bidimensionali di una chiarezza e risoluzione senza precedenti rispetto ad altre tecnologie sonar disponibili. Il progetto sta immettendo sul mercato una nuova tecnologia in grado di mappare gli ambienti subacquei utilizzando i complessi dati di questo sonar in condizioni di scarsa visibilità. I principali settori a cui si rivolge sono: petrolio e gas, energie rinnovabili, pesca, settore pubblico (sicurezza e militare), ambientale e minerario.
Obiettivo
Activities in the underwater domain are essential to the economy and to society in general, holding high expectations for future growth. Unfortunately, the danger faced during underwater works and the fact that it is an uncontrolled environment for humans, make these activities tremendously expensive and insecure. In fact, most underwater operations require to have an overview of the submerged area before even being performed, for both safety and efficiency in operations. The traditional solution to the underwater inspection challenge consists in gathering images with a video camera, normally embedded in an underwater robot. However, very frequently, these activities take place in environments with poor water visibility conditions, deeming the maps unusable and the whole approach a waste of resources. A new generation of imaging sonars, namely the two-dimensional Forward-Looking Sonars (FLS), have produced a recent breakthrough in the market. These devices, also termed acoustic cameras, are able to directly deliver 2D images of unprecedented clarity and resolution compared to other available sonar technologies. However, working with sonar data is much more challenging than processing optical images. Given the lack of solutions in the market to generate maps with this kind of data, a PhD thesis from the University of Girona (UdG) developed a mosaicing pipeline tailored to the peculiarities of FLS images, providing a pioneering way to map underwater environments in low visibility conditions. IQUA Robotics exclusively licensed the technology from the UdG on January 2019 with the aim of evolving it from TRL5 to TRL 9 and make it commercial by 2020. The main sectors that may be interested in the technology are: oil and gas; renewable energies; food (fisheries); public sector (security and military); environmental and mining, to name a few. Thus, the goal of this proposal is to assess the feasibility of the validated technology in the targeted markets.
Campo scientifico
- agricultural sciencesagriculture, forestry, and fisheriesfisheries
- engineering and technologyenvironmental engineeringenergy and fuelsrenewable energy
- engineering and technologyelectrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineeringelectronic engineeringsensorsoptical sensors
- engineering and technologyelectrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineeringelectronic engineeringrobotics
Programma(i)
Argomento(i)
Invito a presentare proposte
Vedi altri progetti per questo bandoBando secondario
H2020-SMEInst-2018-2020-1
Meccanismo di finanziamento
SME-1 - SME instrument phase 1Coordinatore
17003 Girona
Spagna
L’organizzazione si è definita una PMI (piccola e media impresa) al momento della firma dell’accordo di sovvenzione.