AURA - Antenna for Underwater Radio Communications

Challenge / Opportunity

Underwater wireless communications are currently based in acoustic, optical or radio frequency (RF) technologies. While acoustic systems have poor performance in shallow water, optical systems are very susceptible to turbidity and fouling particles, and they require line-of-sight and thus precise alignment.

RF systems have several advantages over acoustic and optical systems such as turbidity and acoustic noise immunity, non-line-of-sight operations, and high bandwidths (up to 100 Mbit/s) at very close range. However, the radiation pattern of RF systems may be highly affected by environmental conditions, namely salinity, jeopardizing communications range and data rate.

Developed at INESC TEC, AURA tackles this limitation of RF systems by automatically adjusting the resonant frequency of the antenna considering surrounding salinity and the position of the receiver device.

Main advantages

• Higher underwater data rate
• Improved operational flexibility in both fresh and seawater

Current development status

Laboratory prototypes