Entering new depths with underwater robotics

The new age of technology is taking us to places that humans have never been before. In particular, one place being explored at NC State is underwater. The Underwater Robotics Club at NC State is a student-led organization that engineers an autonomous underwater robot to complete various tasks—such as navigating obstacle courses and firing torpedoes.

The club competes in the worldwide RoboSub competition held in San Diego each year, sponsored by industry partners such as Blue Origin, Northrop Grumman, and NVIDIA, as well as the US Navy’s Office of Naval Research. International teams of students meet here to demonstrate their robot’s abilities that they have been developing over time.

Jeremy Hosang, a senior in electrical and computer engineering at NC State and the Underwater Robotic Club’s president, describes the event as a “really great experience” to see what other teams have been working on, and draw inspiration from others’ innovation in order to apply it back to NC State’s Seawolf 8 robot.

Building and reinventing the Seawolf robot has been an ongoing task since the clubs’ founding year of 2004. URC has different generations of the robot which has allowed team members to step back from their work and recognize what’s working, and what needs to be improved in the next generation.

Currently, club members are working on their eighth rendition of their underwater robot, hence the name Seawolf 8.

Read more at the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering website →