A novel 3-D locomotion biomimetic robot fish with multiple sensors

In this paper, a novel biomimetic robot fish FAC-I with 3-D locomotion is designed for underwater exploration and surveillance. It is equipped with CCD camera, infrared and pressure sensors to acquire the outside information. The robot fish has a tail thruster imitating the dolphin motion, a pair of pectoral fins and a buoyancy-adjusting mechanical structure BAMS. The tail thruster provides the main propulsion and the pectoral fins are applied to complete the motions such as turning. The BAMS may adjust the volume of the FAC-I by stretching/shrinking a piston to change the robot fishpsilas buoyancy and then the descending/ascending motions may be achieved. In order to implement the information exchange between biomimetic robot fish under water and the console on the ground, an information relay on water combing wireless and wired communication is designed. An environment monitoring platform is developed for displaying the information provided by a CCD camera of FAC-I and recognizing the goal based on the given color. The experiments show the effectiveness of FAC-I.