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Project URSULA: Design of a Robotic Squid for Underwater Manipulation

Berke Gur

TL;DR

The paper presents URSULA, a squid-inspired biomimetic robot designed for dexterous underwater manipulation and as a testbed for emerging underwater technologies. It details its end-to-end design: soft tendon-driven limbs, omni-directional, propeller-less propulsion, model-mediated teleoperation with haptic feedback, high-bandwidth visible-light communication, and a ROS1 software stack with explorer and intervention modes. The authors discuss hardware, software, and simulation environments, report on prototype development and initial pool testing, and outline plans for a deeper-depth second prototype and swarm-capable ROS2 software. The work provides a compact, portable platform that enables evaluation and integration of soft robotics, VR/XR teleoperation, and autonomous-navigation techniques for sub-sea manipulation and intervention.

Abstract

With this paper, the design of a biomimetic robotic squid (dubbed URSULA) developed for dexterous underwater manipulation is presented. The robot serves as a test bed for several novel underwater technologies such as soft manipulators, propeller-less propulsion, model mediated tele-operation with video and haptic feedback, sonar-based underwater mapping, localization, and navigation, and high bandwidth visible light communications. Following the finalization of the detailed design, a prototype is manufactured and is currently undergoing pool tests.

Project URSULA: Design of a Robotic Squid for Underwater Manipulation

TL;DR

The paper presents URSULA, a squid-inspired biomimetic robot designed for dexterous underwater manipulation and as a testbed for emerging underwater technologies. It details its end-to-end design: soft tendon-driven limbs, omni-directional, propeller-less propulsion, model-mediated teleoperation with haptic feedback, high-bandwidth visible-light communication, and a ROS1 software stack with explorer and intervention modes. The authors discuss hardware, software, and simulation environments, report on prototype development and initial pool testing, and outline plans for a deeper-depth second prototype and swarm-capable ROS2 software. The work provides a compact, portable platform that enables evaluation and integration of soft robotics, VR/XR teleoperation, and autonomous-navigation techniques for sub-sea manipulation and intervention.

Abstract

With this paper, the design of a biomimetic robotic squid (dubbed URSULA) developed for dexterous underwater manipulation is presented. The robot serves as a test bed for several novel underwater technologies such as soft manipulators, propeller-less propulsion, model mediated tele-operation with video and haptic feedback, sonar-based underwater mapping, localization, and navigation, and high bandwidth visible light communications. Following the finalization of the detailed design, a prototype is manufactured and is currently undergoing pool tests.

Paper Structure

This paper contains 8 sections, 7 figures, 1 table.

Table of Contents

  1. Introduction
  2. Requirements and Conceptual Design
  3. Detailed Design
  4. Body and Mechanical Design
  5. Electronic Subsystem Design
  6. Software Architecture
  7. Prototype Development and Tests
  8. Conclusions and Future Work

Figures (7)

  • Figure 1: The conceptual design of URSULA.
  • Figure 2: The solid model of the finalized design of URSULA with labeled main components.
  • Figure 3: URSULA limbs; (a) The 3-D solid model of the limb system (showing only a single limb for clarity) and (b) the cross-sectional cut of the limb labeled with the main parts.
  • Figure 4: An early version of the navigation module of the web-based UI developed for URSULA.
  • Figure 5: A view of URSULA in the simulation environment developed for evaluating XR enabled dexterous underwater manipulation Muf24.
  • ...and 2 more figures