Underwater Robotics

From the SeaDrone Facebook page.

Here is a robotic subject I have not dealt much with, but in Louisiana - with all  our rivers, bayous and lakes (and also aquaculture) - this could be a natural and a great robotic educational opportunity.

This is SeaDrone. More info is on the web at their site here. An article is also here on IEEE Spectrum about the idea's developement (Stanford brains again!).

The video above is very interesting. It really might be fun to develop an inexpensive hobby/educational bot (ala Phil Pilgrim's work on the Parallax Forums especially in this thread) - like the ELEV-8 for under water use.

This seems like it fits Parallax's mission. The SeaDrone above seems to have the "right stuff" for such an idea/concept - revised, of course, and made available in an ELEV-8 sort of package. It needs Parallax Control (brains) and the educational materials - but this could be really fun!

This really has me thinking about a new area of robotics that would be fun to explore - practical - and very interesting for students of all ages!