ADCPs in Autonomous Action

Combining the flexibility and power of Acoustic Doppler Profiler (ADCP) technology with the autonomous deployment capability of the Wave Glider platform results in a powerful new tool for monitoring of upper ocean currents.

ADCPs in action on Wave Gliders (2675 KB)

In the attached Marine Technology News white paper, Dr. Peter Spain of Teledyne RD Instruments discusses the new capabilities resulting from deployment of ADCP technology in the Wave Glider. Capabilities now available for flexible monitoring of upper-ocean currents include:

– Re-configuring the ADCP  including turning on or off bottom tracking, changing the current profile, or altering the averaging period for the processed data

– Persistent data collection enabled by the proven Wave Glider endurance in all sea states up to and including tropical storms

– Real time ADCP data reception ashore

– Mission monitoring and adaption by sending new waypoints to the Wave Glider using the Wave Glider Management System

Just as the new tool of the ADCP changed ocean observation when introduced in the 1980s, the Wave Glider is the new tool that enables a quantum leap to new methods for measuring currents in the upper ocean. The ADCP can now be deployed as an autonomous instrument with the ocean robotics of the Wave Glider providing the smart platform to achieve even more from ADCP data collection tasks.

Wave Glider float showing the ADCP transducers and the tether to the glider component.

A comparison of 300 kHz ADCP velocity data from a Wave Glider and a 300 kHz bottom-mount is shown for the eastward and northward velocity components.  The velocity structures are remarkably similar both in magnitude and in temporal variability.