Electromagnetic navigation for smaller unmanned underwater vehicles

Purpose and goal:

The project aims to develop and evaluate the use of existing civil

electromagnetic sensor and ML/AI technology to create a quiet, robust and

energy-efficient navigation solution for small underwater craft. The goal is to enable

covert long-term navigation without using active sensors such as active sonar or

need to visit the surface to get a GPS position. This means that new strategic naval defense capabilities can be developed.

Expected results and effects:

Expected overall results is the transfer of current civilian technology for magnetic field based indoor navigation to a military technology for navigation of small unmanned underwater vehicles. The expected effect of this is an improved Swedish military strategic ability. More precisely, the project is expected to result in a prototype sensor and associated machine learning algorithm for processing sensor data, as well as an evaluation of the technology´s potential during realistic conditions.

Approach and implementation:

The project will be implemented in terms of the following 4 work packages.

WP1 R&D of measurement system: Design of measurement system based on existing EM sensor array for indoor navigation.

WP2 Algoritmutveckling: Adaptation of existing algorithms for EM sensor based navigation for land-based systems adapted to the underwater environment.

WP3 Sea-trials: Experimental measurements under realistic conditions.

WP4 Analyze and evaluation: Analysis of results using statistical methods.