PhD Studentship: Long-range, long-endurance autonomy for challenging underwater environments (1019018FP)

Supervisor: Prof. Eric Rogers

Co-supervisor: Dr. Andrea Munafo, Dr. Lorenzo Brignone, Dr. Catherine Harris, Prof. Jon Downes

Project description

The Marine Autonomous and Robotic Systems Group (MARS) at the National Oceanography Centre (NOC), the Robotics Group at Ifremer and the University of Southampton (UoS) are looking for an excellent candidate to undertake a PhD at the University of Southampton under the UK-France Joint PhD Programme.

The Programme is a 3 years fully-funded (fees and stipend) PhD studentship to UK/French applicants for the development of long-range, long-endurance autonomy for challenging underwater environments. The objective is that to developing algorithms for intelligent on-board control and adaptive mission planning (e.g. maximise data delivery given observations made during the mission) coupled with enhanced situational awareness regarding the environment and the mission goals. Special focus will be given to understanding how the approach interacts with real world robotic constraints such as environmental and/or adversarial disruption of sensor inputs, and resource limitations.

The ideal candidate will have a strong academic background in computer science, mathematics or control or a closely-related numerical discipline. They will have strong mathematical skills, particularly in relation to reasoning about probabilities.  Knowledge of artificial intelligence/robotics techniques and proficiency with a programming language are highly desirable. Due to the nature of the funding, the student must be a UK or French citizen.

Rationale and Methodology:

Ocean-going robots operate within some of the most extreme environments on Earth. In such highly dynamic environments, traditional pre-scripted missions are limiting, based on expectation rather than observation. Consequently, a robot's ability to reason about sensor data and adapt its plan accordingly is crucial to maximising the delivery of mission objectives. This PhD aims to develop techniques for online plan adaptation under uncertainty, to enable a robot to react to opportunities arising mid-mission, for example performing a high-resolution survey of a detected feature. With a focus on implementation within full-scale platforms, the project will model and ensure compliance with real-world operational and logistical constraints, including limited power and communication and the need for operator oversight and accountability. By making incremental online modifications to the plan using techniques such as plan repair and pre-built plan libraries, the set of resulting plans and robot behaviours is bounded and predictable whilst allowing the robot to remain flexible to emerging opportunities and changing resource availability.?The student will have access to resources at two of the top oceanographic research institutions in the world, including some of Europe’s largest fleet of Marine Autonomous Systems, with opportunities to join expeditions at sea using state-of-the-art robotic platforms.

Please contact: Prof. Eric Rogers (etar@ecs.soton.ac.uk) or Dr. Andrea Munafo (andrea.munafo@noc.ac.uk) for further details.  

Key facts

Entry requirements: first or upper second-class degree or equivalent

Closing date: applications should be received no later than1 August 2018 for standard admissions, but later applications may be considered depending on the funds remaining in place.

Duration: four years (full-time)

Funding: full tuition fees, for UK/EU students, and a tax-free stipend of £14,777 per year

Assessment: Nine month and 18 month reports, viva voce and thesis examination

Start date: October

Applying: www.southampton.ac.uk/postgraduate/pgstudy/howdoiapplypg.html

Closing Date: 31 Aug 2018
Post Type: PhD Studentship (Funded)