Sensing oscillations in unsteady flow for better robotic swimming efficiency

J. Ježcov, O. Akanyeti, L.D. Chambers, M. Kruusmaa

Research output: Chapter or section in a book/report/conference proceedingChapter in a published conference proceeding

17 Citations (SciVal)

Abstract

Turbulent flows are often treated as a noisy environment by control algorithms of underwater robots. However, aquatic animals such as fish have learned to take advantage of certain unsteady flow. Periodic complex flow, such as that found in the wake of cylinders has been shown to offer energy saving opportunities to fish. We built a fish-like robot with an integrated pressure sensor array housed in the head. The robot can control its tail beat synchronization with respect to the periodic oscillations in the flow behind a cylinder. We show that vortices, represented here by pressure maxima, can be detected and exploited to increase the swimming efficiency of the robot fish while it remains rigidly mounted to a force plate. Force measurements show an efficiency gain of 23% when the tail beat of the robotic fish is synchronized at a particular phase lag.
Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationConference Proceedings - IEEE International Conference on Systems, Man and Cybernetics
PublisherIEEE
Pages91-96
Number of pages6
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2012
Event2012 IEEE International Conference on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics, SMC 2012 - Seoul, Korea, Republic of
Duration: 13 Oct 201213 Oct 2012

Conference

Conference2012 IEEE International Conference on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics, SMC 2012
Country/TerritoryKorea, Republic of
CitySeoul
Period13/10/1213/10/12

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