The Aquatic Surface Robot (AnSweR), a lightweight, low cost, multipurpose unmanned research vessel

Even though a few examples of aquatic surface robots exist, they are generally expensive, relatively large and heavy and tailored to custom-made hardware/software components that are not openly available to a broad public. In this work, the Aquatic Surface Robot (AnSweR), a newly-designed, lightweight, low cost, open-source, multipurpose unmanned research vessel is presented. The AnSweR features a lightweight and compact design that makes it fit in a backpack. Low-noise operation (in and above the surface) is achieved with a propulsion system based on two water-jets. Only affordable commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) components are adopted. The primary goal of the AnSweR is to map underwater landscapes and to collect bathymetry data in lakes, rivers, and coastal ecosystems. A modular hardware and software architecture is adopted. This architecture allows the AnSweR to be equipped with a customisable add-on set of sensors and actuators to enable a variety of research activities, such as measuring environmental variables (e.g., salinity, oxygen, temperature) and sampling operations (e.g., sediment, vegetation, microplastics). The software architecture is based on the Robot Operating System (ROS). This paper describes the design of AnSweR as the main scientific contribution and presents preliminary simulation and experimental results which illustrate its potential.