Satellites and mobile phones, built on international standards, help the world get connected. But the communications technology we use on land does not work well underwater. As water covers over 70 percent of the earth's surface, NATO has sponsored research into establishing the first ever digital underwater communications standard.
The NATO STO Centre for Maritime Research and Experimentation (CMRE) located in La Spezia, Italy, has developed a standard for underwater acoustic communications called JANUS, which has now been recognized as a NATO standard by all NATO Allies. This marks the first time ever for a digital underwater communication protocol to be acknowledged at international level and opens the way to develop many exciting underwater communication applications.
TRANSCRIPT:
INTERVIEW ALESSANDRO BERNI, HEAD, INFORMATION LABORATORIES OFFICE, CMRE
1. (00:00-00:25) Progress in unmanned vehicles, robotics, sensor networks can be applied to deliver new capabilities that were impossible before, or to do traditional missions in ways that are less expensive and less risky. And that’s where CMRE plays a role, in our engagement with the research community, in creating platforms which are interoperable, (which) can do different missions and (which) can communicate even underwater.
2. (00:26-00:38) Well, it will never replace the Internet as we know it. However, it will provide a very important extension to an important domain, which is largely unexplored as of today.
3. (00:39-01:14) Having a standard means creating the conditions for interoperability and, more in general, for the creation of new capabilities and maybe markets: if everyone speaks a different language, they will not be able to talk, to communicate and to progress. The work that the Centre is doing is just try to pave the road towards a future underwater internet, where sensors, unmanned vehicles and human operators on boats can communicate and cooperate for the good of everyone.
4. (01:15-01:31) You could envision really a lot of applications that have yet to be devised. What we are doing here is creating the fundamental building blocks that will enable others to build on that and to develop new things.
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