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About

About

Nuno Cruz holds a MSc. in Digital Systems Engineering from UMIST, UK, and a PhD. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Porto, in Portugal. He is currently an Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Engineering of the University of Porto and a Coordinator at the Centre for Robotics and Autonomous Systems at INESC TEC. Nuno Cruz is an Associate Editor of the IEEE Journal of Oceanic Engineering and has over 100 publications in journals and proceedings of international conferences. He has been involved in the development and deployment of marine robotic vehicles for more than 20 years. He has led the design of multiple autonomous vehicles at the University of Porto and INESC TEC, namely the Zarco and Gama ASVs and the MARES and TriMARES AUVs. His current research interests include the development of strategies for the efficient use of autonomous vehicles at sea, including the concept of adaptive sampling.

More info in http://oceansys.fe.up.pt/

Interest
Topics
Details

Details

018
Publications

2023

Model Identification and Control of a Buoyancy Change Device

Authors
Carneiro, JF; Pinto, JB; de Almeida, FG; Cruz, NA;

Publication
ACTUATORS

Abstract
There are several compelling reasons for exploring the ocean, for instance, the potential for accessing valuable resources, such as energy and minerals; establishing sovereignty; and addressing environmental issues. As a result, the scientific community has increasingly focused on the use of autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) for ocean exploration. Recent research has demonstrated that buoyancy change modules can greatly enhance the energy efficiency of these vehicles. However, the literature is scarce regarding the dynamic models of the vertical motion of buoyancy change modules. It is therefore difficult to develop adequate depth controllers, as this is a very complex task to perform in situ. The focus of this paper is to develop simplified linear models for a buoyancy change module that was previously designed by the authors. These models are experimentally identified and used to fine-tune depth controllers. Experimental results demonstrate that the controllers perform well, achieving a virtual zero steady-state error with satisfactory dynamic characteristics.

2023

Estimation of Sediments in Underwater Wall Corners using a Mechanical Scanning Sonar

Authors
Gonçalves, CF; Cruz, NA; Ferreira, BM;

Publication
2023 IEEE Underwater Technology (UT)

Abstract

2022

An Autonomous System for Collecting Water Samples from the Surface

Authors
Pinto, AF; Cruz, NA; Ferreira, BM; Abreu, NM; Goncalves, CE; Villa, MP; Matos, AC; Honorio, LD; Westin, LG;

Publication
OCEANS 2022

Abstract

2022

Design and Experimental Tests of a Buoyancy Change Module for Autonomous Underwater Vehicles

Authors
Carneiro, JF; Pinto, JB; de Almeida, FG; Cruz, NA;

Publication
ACTUATORS

Abstract
Ocean exploration is of major importance for several reasons, including energy and mineral resource retrieval, sovereignty, and environmental concerns. The use of autonomous underwater vehicles (AUV) has thus been receiving increased attention from the scientific community. In this context, it has been shown that the use of buoyancy change modules (BCMs) can significantly improve the energy efficiency of an AUV. However, the literature regarding the detailed design of these modules is scarce. This paper contributes to this field by describing the development of an electromechanical buoyancy change module prototype to be incorporated into an existing AUV. A detailed description of the constraints and compromises existing in the design of the device components is presented. In addition, the mechanical design of the hull based on FEM simulations is described in detail. The prototype is experimentally tested in a shallow pool where its full functionality is shown. The paper also presents preliminary experimental values of the power consumption of the device and compares them with the ones provided by existing models in the literature.

2022

Genetic Algorithm to Solve Optimal Sensor Placement for Underwater Vehicle Localization with Range Dependent Noises

Authors
Villa, M; Ferreira, B; Cruz, N;

Publication
SENSORS

Abstract
In source localization problems, the relative geometry between sensors and source will influence the localization performance. The optimum configuration of sensors depends on the measurements used for the source location estimation, how these measurements are affected by noise, the positions of the source, and the criteria used to evaluate the localization performance. This paper addresses the problem of optimum sensor placement in a plane for the localization of an underwater vehicle moving in 3D. We consider sets of sensors that measure the distance to the vehicle and model the measurement noises with distance dependent covariances. We develop a genetic algorithm and analyze both single and multi-objective problems. In the former, we consider as the evaluation metric the arithmetic average along the vehicle trajectory of the maximum eigenvalue of the inverse of the Fisher information matrix. In the latter, we estimate the Pareto front of pairs of common criteria based on the Fisher information matrix and analyze the evolution of the sensor positioning for the different criteria. To validate the algorithm, we initially compare results with a case with a known optimal solution and constant measurement covariances, obtaining deviations from the optimal less than 0.1%. Posterior, we present results for an underwater vehicle performing a lawn-mower maneuver and a spiral descent maneuver. We also present results restricting the allowed positions for the sensors.

Supervised
thesis

2022

Autonomous Robotic Bathymetric Mapping

Author
João Burmester Campos

Institution
UP-FEUP

2022

Information-aware Feature-based Underwater Localization and Planning

Author
António José Ventura de Oliveira

Institution
UP-FEUP

2021

Underwater picking

Author
Samuel Aguiar Pereira

Institution
UP-FEUP

2021

Information-aware Feature-based Underwater Localization and Planning

Author
António José Ventura de Oliveira

Institution
UP-FEUP

2021

Experimental evaluation of segmentation algorithms for corner detection in sonar images

Author
Pedro Miguel Linhares Oliveira

Institution
UP-FEUP