Design and evaluation of an artificial lateral line for an amphibious spherical robots

The underwater environment is complex and diverse, and it is difficult to explore the ocean, especially in the deep sea area. The lack of light, high pressure, and lack of oxygen make it difficult for humans to work in such extreme environments. Therefore, people are beginning to hand over the burden of exploring the ocean to underwater robots. The underwater robot's perception of the underwater environment is very important for controlling the motion of the underwater robot. However, in the environment where the light is lacking at night and in the deep sea, and in the narrow space, the robot vision consisting of infrared and camera is traditionally used. The system is difficult to function, so a new sensing system is needed to assist the underwater robot in recognizing the surrounding environment. In nature, real fish use their lateral line system to sense the surrounding environment. Based on the principle of bionics, we have developed an artificial lateral line system on a bionic spherical robot. The basic principle of this artificial lateral line system is to use the pressure sensor to sense the water flow pressure around the robot when the robot swims under water, thus establishing a relationship model between the robot swimming speed and the water flow pressure to realize the relative speed of identifying the underwater robot and the water flow.