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Text:
Guillemette Tracou
Their scales glisten like the Crown Jewels and they’ve
been on display in London since August 2005. Not in
the Tower, but the County Hall Aquarium, because they’re
three very special fish. They look just like the carp
they’re modelled on and their names are G9-1,
G9-2 and G9-3, which shows how far they’ve come
since G1 (Generation 1). Each one of these robot fish
has four computers and ten sensors (including a depth-gauge,
gyroscope, accelerometer, inclinometer and infrared
obstacle
detector) embedded in it, as well as a form
of artificial intelligence that allows it to swim
around just like real fish.
This high-tech trio was developed by Professor Huosheng
Hu and his team of robotics specialists at the University
of Essex in south-east England. It has taken them
three years of work with London Aquarium experts to
analyse and mechanically reproduce the undulating
movement that propels real fish. And their latest
robots swim round just like the real thing. Why not
just give them a propeller? Because fishy swishing,
the result of thousands of years of evolution, makes
them quieter, more manoeuvrable and more energy-efficient.
Professor Hu’s latest-generation trio can swim
to a depth of three metres, reach a top speed of half
a metre per second and cruise at an energy-saving
30 centimetres per second, which means they can swim
up to five hours before recharging.
The next step is to enable them to swim to a battery
charger and “fill up”, and then give them
the ability to communicate with each other and operate
as a team. It is more efficient to network several
small robots than to use one large machine, since
they are cheaper, more robust and can cover a larger
area. The fish could also eventually be controlled
via the Web by a “cyber-supervisor” sitting
at a computer.
One day soon, the descendants of G9-1, G9-2 and G9-3 could well be used by industry and for oceanographic
exploration and observation without disturbing the
real fish.
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