Mirmalek Zara, Raineault Nicole A
NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA, United States.
BAER Institute, Moffett, CA, United States.
Front Robot AI. 2024 Oct 18;11:1454923. doi: 10.3389/frobt.2024.1454923. eCollection 2024.
Conducting sea-going ocean science no longer needs to be limited to the number of berths on a ship given that telecommunications, computing, and networking technologies onboard ships have become familiar mechanisms for expanding scientists' reach from onshore. The oceanographic community routinely works with remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) and pilots to access real-time video and data from the deep sea, while onboard a ship. The extension of using an ROV and its host vessel's live-streaming capabilities has been popularized for almost 3 decades as a telepresence technology. Telepresence-enabled vessels with ROVs have been employed for science, education, and outreach, giving a greater number of communities viewing access to ocean science. However, the slower development of technologies and social processes enabling sustained real-time involvement between scientists on-ship and onshore undermines the potential for broader access, which limits the possibility of increasing inclusivity and discoveries through a diversity of knowledge and capabilities. This article reviews ocean scientists' use of telepresence for ROV-based deep-sea research and funded studies of telepresence capabilities. The authors summarize these studies findings and conditions that lead to defining the use of telepresence-enabled vessels for "remote science at sea." Authors define remote science at sea as a type of ocean expedition, an additional capability, not a replacement for all practices by which scientists conduct ocean research. Remote science for ocean research is an expedition at-sea directed by a distributed science team working together from at least two locations (on-ship and onshore) to complete their science objectives for which primary data is acquired by robotic technologies, with connectivity supported by a high-bandwidth satellite and the telepresence-enabled ship's technologies to support the science team actively engaged before, during, and after dives across worksites. The growth of productive ocean expeditions with remote science is met with social, technical, and logistical challenges that impede the ability of remote scientists to succeed. In this article, authors review telepresence-enabled ocean science, define and situate the adjoined model of remote science at sea, and some infrastructural, technological and social considerations for conducting and further developing remote science at sea.
鉴于船上的电信、计算和网络技术已成为扩大科学家从岸上获取资源范围的常见手段，开展海洋科学考察不再需要局限于船上的铺位数量。海洋学界经常借助遥控潜水器（ROV）和操作人员，在船上获取来自深海的实时视频和数据。作为一种远程临场技术，利用ROV及其母船的直播功能已流行了近三十年。配备ROV的远程临场船只已用于科学研究、教育及科普活动，让更多群体能够观看海洋科学相关内容。然而，能够使船上和岸上科学家持续实时互动的技术及社会进程发展较为缓慢，这削弱了更广泛参与的潜力，限制了通过知识和能力的多样性增加包容性及实现新发现的可能性。本文回顾了海洋科学家在基于ROV的深海研究中对远程临场技术的应用，以及对远程临场能力的资助研究。作者总结了这些研究的结果以及促成将配备远程临场技术的船只用于“海上远程科学研究”的条件。作者将海上远程科学研究定义为一种海洋考察类型，是一种额外的能力，并非取代科学家进行海洋研究的所有方式。海洋研究的远程科学考察是由一个分布式科学团队从至少两个地点（船上和岸上）协同工作指挥的海上考察，旨在完成其科学目标，主要数据通过机器人技术获取，由高带宽卫星提供连接，并借助配备远程临场技术的船只的技术，以支持科学团队在潜水作业前、作业期间和作业后在各个工作地点积极开展工作。远程科学考察在海洋研究中的发展面临着社会、技术和后勤方面的挑战，这些挑战阻碍了远程科学家取得成功。在本文中，作者回顾了配备远程临场技术的海洋科学，定义并阐述了海上远程科学研究的相关模式，以及开展和进一步发展海上远程科学研究的一些基础设施、技术和社会方面的考量因素。
