A few days ago, “four Wave Gliders—self propelled robots, each about the size of a dolphin—left San Francisco for a journey that combined will total 60,000 kilometers. Built by Liquid Robotics, the robots will travel together to Hawaii, then split into pairs, one pair heading to Japan, the other to Australia. Waves will power their propulsion systems and the sun will power the sensors that will be measuring things like water salinity, temperature, clarity, and oxygen content; collecting weather data, and gathering information on wave features and currents. It’s not going to be an easy journey—the little robots will face rough weather and have to dodge big ships” reports Tekla Perry in IEEE Spectrum–Automaton.

Bloomberg recently published a video clip on the project. The video helps to understand the workings of the wave glider: Bloomberg Video on Wave Gliders

The next video shows underwater footage and helps understand the mechanics:

Java Father James Gosling (Image via Wikipedia)

Says Java father James Gosling, who now heads up Liquid Robotics’ software operation: Liquid Robotics has “a technically interesting challenge, that could save the world, and is economically viable—these three things don’t come together that often.”

I find this a fascinating technology and it is good to see that my old friend and colleague at Sun, James Gosling, has found a new challenge here.

Read the full article here: Liquid Robotics’ Wave Gliders Begin Historic Swim Across Pacific – IEEE Spectrum.

What do you think? Will we move cargo this way in the future across the oceans?

Related articles

• Liquid Robotics’ Wave Gliders Begin Historic Swim Across Pacific – IEEE Spectrum (archon236.wordpress.com)
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• Autonomous Wave Gliders Attempt Historic Solo Pacific Crossing [Science] (gizmodo.com)
• Ocean Robots Race Across The Pacific (gcaptain.com)
• Seafaring boffin bots in record-breaking bid to chart Pacific (go.theregister.com)
• Ocean-faring robots set sail on Guinness record attempt (news.cnet.com)
• 4 Wave Gliders Begin Their Autonomous Pacific Crossing Attempt (tech.slashdot.org)
• Java-Begründer arbeitet am “Rad für den Ozean” (silicon.de)