Revealing the hydrodynamics principles of three-dimensional fish schools: From biology to schooling
Abstract
Underwater vehicle technology is on the verge of a paradigm shift. Current bio-inspired swimming platforms have nearly matched the,speeds and efficiencies of real fish. Now, these platforms are on the cusp of operating as multi-agent collectives, which would fur,ther improve efficiency and unlock novel missions that require distributed tasks or swarming. To make bio-robotic collectives a real,ity and have them access significant speed and efficiency benefits will require a highly integrated, interdisciplinary program, one,that will fuse the hydrodynamic principles of schooling interactions, distilled from biology, with school-level control. Our researc,h program will address three key unresolved questions that will reveal the hydrodynamic principles behind fish and bio-robotic schoo,ling: (Q1) What are energetically-optimal, speed-enhancing, and/or stable three-dimensional schooling states? (Q2) Does fish school,organization and synchronization exploit these hydrodynamics? And, (Q3) howis coordinated, stable, and high-performance schooling ac,hieved through the fusion of hydrodynamic principles and control?Our goal is to discover and demonstrate the hydrodynamic principles, behind high-speed, high-efficiency schooling. Our simulation tools and reduced-order experiments will predict optimal solutions tha,t will be demonstrated through experiments on schools of fish and bio-robotic systems. We will discover the hydrodynamic origins and, mechanisms behind the performance benefits of schooling with an emphasis on linking these to the organization, synchronization, and, body deformations of three-dimensional swimmers. New findings and hypotheses from the biological/bio-robotics studies will provide,critical feedback to the fundamental hydrodynamics. We will quantify the hydrodynamic forces that influence stability and use this i,nformation to develop control strategies that optimize school speed and efficiency. The stable and partially stable states we discov,er will reduce, orpossibly eliminate, the need for control systems, essentially delegating the control to the underlying physics. By, elucidating the physics of schooling, we will understand the biological drivers of schooling fish, be able to predict high-speed, h,igh-efficiency schooling formations, then demonstrate those formations in coordinated bio-robotic schools. This will enable the engi,neering design and control of schools of bio-robotic devices that will match or surpass the performance of conventional rotary prope,ller vehicles. These devices will also be able to accomplish distributed tasks, creating a novel paradigm for underwater vehicle mi,ssion capabilities.
Document Details
- Document Type
- DoD Grant Award
- Publication Date
- Sep 08, 2022
- Source ID
- N000142212616
Entities
People
- Keith W Moored
Organizations
- Lehigh University
- Office of Naval Research
- United States Navy