Long-range near-optimal path planning for gliders in complex high-energy environments

Autonomous gliders may be instrumented with sensors and used to gather data and perform surveillance in strategically critical areas, but their use is currently limited to low-energy environments due to the challenges of path planning and navigation in high-energy environments, including variable environments (e.g., eddies and currents resulting from weather and seasonal effects), and particularly where ocean currents exceed glider speeds. In this effort we develop a navigation planner for gliders in complex high-energy ocean environments to achieve point-to-point navigation, and explore the use of this planner for optimizing a team of underwater gliders. These techniques will extend the capabilities of teams of autonomous vehicles to perform missions in strategically important areas.