Article Performance Analysis of Ice-Relative Upward-Looking Doppler Navigation of Underwater Vehicles Beneath Moving Sea Ice Laughlin D. L. Barker 1,2 and Louis L. Whitcomb 1,* 1 Department of Mechanical Engineering, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD 21218, USA;
[email protected] 2 Department of Marine Operations, Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, Moss Landing, CA 95039, USA * Correspondence:
[email protected] Abstract: This paper addresses the problem of ice-relative underwater robotic vehicle navigation relative to moving or stationary contiguous sea ice. A review of previously-reported under-ice navigation methods is given, as well as motivation for the use of under-ice robotic vehicles with precision navigation capabilities. We then describe our proposed approach, which employs two or more satellite navigation beacons atop the sea ice along with other precision vehicle and ship mounted navigation sensors to estimate vehicle, ice, and ship states by means of an Extended Kalman Filter. A performances sensitivity analysis for a simulated 7.7 km under ice survey is reported. The number and the location of ice deployed satellite beacons, rotational and translational ice velocity, and separation of ship-based acoustic range sensors are varied, and their effects on estimate error Citation: Barker, L.D.L.; Whitcomb, and uncertainty are examined. Results suggest that increasing the number and/or separation of L.L. Performance Analysis of ice-deployed satellite beacons reduces estimate uncertainty, whereas increasing separation of ship- Ice-Relative Upward-Looking based acoustic range sensors has little impact on estimate uncertainty. Decreasing ice velocity is also Doppler Navigation of Underwater correlated with reduced estimate uncertainty.