I-Corps: Underwater Wireless Communications for the Blue Economy

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The broader impact/commercial potential is the potential development of underwater wireless communication systems. Compared to terrestrial communication, underwater communications have low data rates because it uses acoustic waves instead of electromagnetic waves. The proposed communication modem uses high-frequency acoustic bands to support high data rates. It may have a significant impact on ocean technologies and applications, such as autonomous underwater vehicles (AUV), ocean navigation and coastal mapping, ocean energy harvesting, and underwater sensing and surveying. The AUV market and the underwater acoustic communication sector are predicted to be the fastest-growing blue economy sectors in the next five years with a 23.1% and 10.8% CAGR (Compound Annual Growth Rate), respectively. The proposed technology may have the potential to enable and accelerate the commercialization of underwater acoustic communication systems that may impact the growth of the blue economy.This I-Corps project is based on the development of underwater acoustic transmitters and receivers that leverage multiple-input multiple-output communication technology to achieve high data rates. The proposed technology utilizes a large number of transmitting and receiving elements, as well as receiver algorithms to potentially improve the reliability and data rate. More than 30 real ocean and lake experiments have demonstrated potential 20x ~100x higher data rates than conventional acoustic modems. In addition, the proposed technology may transmit compressed videos and images at a 200 kbps – 500 kbps rate while the conventional underwater acoustic modem can transmit only text or low-rate sensing data at 5 kbps – 10 kbps. The technology may enable underwater WiFi services to connect many Internet of Underwater Things (IoUT) such as underwater sensors and Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUVs) and support wireless video transmission through water.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.