Nereus was the only robot that could reach the deepest parts of the ocean (via Nature)
Oceanic exploration may be even tougher before; the only robot that can explore the deepest ocean trenches perished on the job. Nereus was a hybrid ROV that could operate autonomously or be controlled remotely by scientists. What made it so unique was how it could explore parts of the ocean 20,000 feet below the surface. Sadly, Nereus imploded in the Pacific Ocean in 2014 due to unknown reasons.
Is the robot getting a replacement? No, according to Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution who built the robot. Apparently, the WHOI team wanted to build a replacement for the Nereus, but decided to invest the $3 million insurance payout in less fragile and risky projects. But that doesn't mean they're giving up on ocean exploration. The scientists plan to build landers, bots that sink down to collect debris, and continue improving their other undersea vehicles that don't go as deep. This will limit exploration opportunities and may even restrict how many samples can be collected, but the team is hoping to improve this.
The original Nereus cost around $8 million to build with funding from the US National Science Foundation, the Office of Naval Research, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. But just because the WHOI aren't planning for the Nereus 2 there are other organizations working on undersea vehicles. One of them is the Schmidt Ocean Institute, who are planning to build a series of submarines that may be able to dive as deep as the Nereus by 2019. Another team is the Shanghai Ocean University in China, which wants to build three landers, an ROV and a human-occupied vehicle. The Xprize Foundation is getting in on the action as well.
The organization is holding a competition called the Shell Ocean Discovery Xprize, which challenges teams around the globe to advance deep-sea technologies for autonomous, fast and high-resolution ocean exploration. The prize is a total of $7 million in awards to those who can invent robots that can go as deep as 4,000m (13,123 ft). There is also a $4 million grand prize and a $1 million runner-up prize that will go to groups that provide the sharpest maps on top of meeting requirements for autonomy, depth, and speed. The $1 million milestone prize will be split between the top 10 teams and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is tossing in $1 million for teams that find objects through biological and chemical clues.
Don't expect to keep tabs on these projects or the results, it'll take a while for anything to be released. There are 9 months to sign up, a year to design and create the robots, and 18 months of judging and testing. This means the competition will be running for three years, so unless you specialize in robotics you may just wanted to stick with Lucky Lotto.
The Nereus may have perished, but with so many other foundations trying to pickup the slack, oceanic exploration won't be stopping anytime soon.
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