CUAUV Missions: Overview

Over the past ten years, CUAUV has built 8 different fully functional Autonomous Underwater Vehicles. For most of this history, vehicle missions were focused entirely around the AUVSI AUV competition. This competition combines visual, acoustic and navigational tasks into an underwater obstacle course that the vehicle must complete autonomously. Recently, CUAUV has also been running missions as a part of the Floating Classroom Project to study Macrophyte growth in Cayuga lake. CUAUV also conducts many volunteer and outreach activities geared at increasing interest in math, science, and engineering in the community.

AUVSI/ONR Competition missions

One of CUAUV’s primary objectives each year is to successfully complete the competition mission for the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International (AUVSI)
a Autonomous Underwater Vehicle Competition. Teams from around the world compete at this annual event, which takes place each summer at the TRANSDEC Facility in San Diego, California. Completing the competition requires each vehicle to autonomously execute a sequence of tasks while remaining fully submerged. Missions for this competition include visual and acoustic tasks.

For pictures from last year's competition, visit the Competition Image Gallery.

For more information on the competition, visit the AUVSI Student AUV Competition website.

For images of the competition elements through our cameras, visit the Underwater Pictures Image Gallery.

Lake Research

On Saturday, May 9, 2009, CUAUV participated in the first of three interactive floating classroom projects. The team launched Triton from the deck of the M/V Haendel (the "floating classroom"). The vehicle examined Macrophyte growth on the bottom of the southwest end of Cayuga Lake. A second vegetation growth survey took place on July 12, 2009, with Nova. CUAUV will be participating in one more session in September. The results from these surveys show what vegetation in what quantities is growing in Cayuga lake, providing a snapshot of the region in May, July, and September. It also gives CUAUV the opportunity to work off of a boat, in waters not quite as gentle as a swimming pool.

Community Outreach

In addition to our technical activities and missions, CUAUV also conducts number of outreach programs each year. These programs are a good way to give back to the community and to improve team moral. Some of our outreach activities in the last year include a workshop for 80 junior girl scouts, two 8 week afterschool programs at a local elementary school, a presentation at the Ithaca Sciencenter, and participation in several Diversity Programs in Engineering events.