Conrado Tapado, UW Undergraduates students Derek Martin, left, and Ryan Cox work on instrumentation with the BluHaptics team.
University of Washington - It should be just as easy to use a robotic arm as it is to use your own hand. That's the thinking behind University of Washington startup BluHaptics , which is taking telerobotics — controlling robots from a distance — to a new level: underwater. Using technology developed by Howard Chizeck 's lab in the Department of Electrical Engineering, a team of UW scientists and engineers working at the Applied Physics Laboratory is creating a control system for underwater remotely operated vehicles, or ROVs. These instruments can perform a variety of undersea tasks too dangerous — or even impossible — for humans, including oil and gas exploration, biohazard clean-up and mining, and environmentally sensitive scientific research. In June, the UW and BluHaptics team will travel to Washington, D.C. to showcase this technology at the SmartAmerica Challenge, as part of the Smart Emergency Response Systems team. The SmartAmerica Challenge Summit will be a three-day event, including a White House presentation, a technology exposition and a technical-level meeting. The UW research team is working with a "submersible manipulator test bed" at the APL, which is made up of specialized, submersible equipment similar to what's used in the oil and gas industry for offshore operations.
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