Russian scientists have developed and deployed an advanced underwater robotic system, Smart Fish, to carry out high-efficiency hydrological research in the Arctic and the Far East, local media reported on Saturday.
Smart Fish is a towed robotic platform equipped with a sealed compartment for scientific instruments, control surfaces, and specialized fairings. While being pulled by a vessel, it collects real-time hydrological data from the seabed and transmits it to operators on board.
University officials said the system’s efficiency far surpasses traditional methods. In a 12-hour operational window, the robot can perform around 500,000 measurements, compared with roughly 60 using conventional oceanographic techniques.
Beyond Arctic exploration, the robot has also been used for environmental monitoring near the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in the Pacific Ocean and to study king crab migrations in the Sea of Japan. Developers are now integrating machine vision and neural networks to automatically identify and count marine species.
