IEEE Robotics & Automation Magazine - June 2019 - 94

Underwater Robots
From Remotely Operated Vehicles to
Intervention-Autonomous Underwater Vehicles
By Yvan R. Petillot, Gianluca Antonelli, Giuseppe Casalino, and Fausto Ferreira

surveys and mine countermeasures), they have not yet hit the
mainstream. In this article, we review the state of the art in
unmanned underwater vehicles (UUVs), which include
ROVs and AUVs; current obstacles to their adoption, both
technical and commercial; and recent advances in technology.
We also present an outlook on the future of these systems.
Brief History of UUVs
Robotics has played a major role in subsea marine science,
engineering, and operations since the introduction of ROVs.
Initially designed for marine science and rescue operations,
they became mainstream in the 1980s as oil and gas exploitation reached depths exceeding the reach of human divers.
ROVs, which are teleoperated robotic systems (see Figure 1),
are now the mainstream tool of subsea operations, enabling
the performance of many tasks, from construction to

Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MRA.2019.2908063
Date of publication: 3 May 2019

94

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IEEE ROBOTICS & AUTOMATION MAGAZINE

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JUNE 2019

1070-9932/19©2019IEEE

IMAGE LICENSED BY INGRAM PUBLISHING

R

emotely operated vehicles (ROVs) revolutionized
the subsea industry when they were introduced in
the 1960s. They were more powerful and
inherently safer, and they could go deeper than
divers. However, they require a tether and a
support ship, which makes their use complex and expensive.
Autonomous marine vehicles (AMVs) have long been seen
as a game changer in the exploration and exploitation of the
marine environment. Repeated access to remote and
hazardous places for data gathering and intervention,
enabled by their autonomy, is the key to their adoption.
While historically the focus has been on autonomous
underwater vehicles (AUVs), unmanned surface vehicles
(USVs) have recently been developed and adopted at an
increasing rate. Interestingly, whereas AMVs (AUVs and
USVs) have now been adopted in niche areas (bathymetric



IEEE Robotics & Automation Magazine - June 2019

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Robotics & Automation Magazine - June 2019

Contents
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