Abstract
Underwater experiments with unmanned vehicles are complex, costly, time-consuming and in some circumstances potentially dangerous, involving the risk of losing or damaging the robots. The nature of the underwater environment, makes it very difficult, for researchers, to observe the evolution of the running system. Simulators are useful tools for the development of unmanned vehicle software, algorithm benchmarking and system preliminary validation. In this work, the problem of simulating a complex underwater scenario for marine robotics and a comparative analysis of simulators for marine robotics are presented. Relevant sensors for underwater robots under development, such as multibeam and imaging 2D sonar were implemented in two simulators and tested in a realistic experimental scenario like a flooded mine.

Abstract
Oil spill incidents in the sea or harbors occur with some regularity during exploration, production, and transport of petroleum products. In order to mitigate the impact of the oil spill in the marine life, immediate, safety, effective and ecofriendly actions must be taken. Autonomous vehicles can assume an important contribution by establishing a cooperative and coordinated intervention. This paper presents the development of a path planning control-law methods for an autonomous surface vehicle (ASV) being able to contour the oil spill while is deploying microorganisms and nutrients (bioremediation) capable of mitigating and contain the oil spill spread with the collaboration of a UAV vehicle. An oil spill simulation scenario was developed in Gazebo to support the evaluation of the cooperative actions between the ASV and UAV and to infer the ASV path planning for each one of the proposed control-law methods.

Abstract
In this work an acoustic tag detector was developed for the integration in a mobile robotic fish tracking architecture. The present paper presents both the developed system and preliminary results with particular emphasis of the developed solution with the tag manufacturer receiver. The work has been developed in the context of the MYTAG Portuguese RD project, addressing the study and characterisation of the European flounder migrations in the northern estuarine environments of Portugal. The detector is to be integrated in a tracking system using autonomous surface vehicles and fixed buoys. The main objective is to detect tags inserted surgically in flounders for the MYTAG project, while simultaneously identifying them. A detector solution is presented allowing for the detection and identification of V7 VEMCO tags and preliminary comparative results with the commercially available manufacturer receivers are also presented and discussed.