Realtime in-ocean submerged collision avoidance via biomimetic electrostatic imaging

This paper explores a technique to exploit Biomimetic Electrostatic Imaging (BEI) for the purposes of short-range high-speed detection and tracking of submerged obstacles based on their conductivity deviation from the background ocean environment. BEI uses conductivity and Coulomb's law rather than electromagnetic or acoustic (SONAR) principles to provide more rapid imaging at substantially reduced output powers making the technique perfect for Uncrewed Underwater Vehicles (UUV) seeking to align for docking, avoid obstacles while traversing, perform relative station keeping (formation management), or track/follow a target object. It is demonstrated to work in real-time against the type of short-range targets that pose a collision threat.