Microplastics-Sensing Autonomous Underwater Vehicle 2018
Designers: Jordan Nollman, Jason Wilbur, Rich Orsini, Matt Bettencourt and Robert de Saint Phalle, Sprout Studios, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USAManufacturer: Draper Laboratory, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA
Draper’s Microplastics-Sensing Autonomous Underwater Vehicle is the first-in-class for microplastic sensing drones. Microplastics in the ocean’s waterways are an ever-growing invisible threat, one that is increasingly becoming part of our everyday lives. Currently, little is known about the volume, flow, and distribution of microplastics in waterways because no such measurement solution exists. Draper’s AUV can detect and analyze invisible microplastics, and enable scientists to understand where they are originating from, where they are most prominent and how to prevent them from contaminating our waters. When the AUV is deployed, it skims the top nine meters of the water where most microplastics are located, scanning for microplastics, testing for specific types, and ultimately relaying GPS coordinates into a heat map. With this information, the public and policymakers can be alerted to take the right actions to overcome the threat of microplastics.
