Robot Goes Fishing: Rapid, High-Resolution Biological Hotspot Mapping in Coral Reefs with Vision-Guided Autonomous Underwater Vehicles

Coral reefs are fast-changing and complex ecosystems that are crucial to monitor and study. Biological hotspot detection can help coral reef managers prioritize limited resources for monitoring and intervention tasks. Here, we explore the use of autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) with cameras, coupled with visual detectors and photogrammetry, to map and identify these hotspots. This approach can provide high spatial resolution information in fast feedback cycles. To the best of our knowledge, we present one of the first attempts at …

autonomous cameras coral cs.cv cs.ro detection ecosystems explore fishing managers mapping monitoring resources robot study tasks underwater vehicles vision