Collaborative Mission Launches Thermal-Powered Profiling Float

Seatrec, a leader in thermal-powered, long-endurance subsea drones, has successfully launched a collaborative scientific mission to develop new autonomous profiling float capabilities powered by ocean temperature differences to collect critical data on ocean health and carbon cycling.

This mission began with a booth discussion at the American Geophysical Union (AGU)-sponsored Ocean Sciences Meeting 2024 (OSM24), held in New Orleans in February 2024. During the event, Seatrec CEO and Founder Yi Chao, Ph.D., met with Mark Altabet, Ph.D., Professor and Chair of the School for Marine Science & Technology at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, and Eric A. D’Asaro, Ph.D., Senior Principal Oceanographer at the Applied Physics Laboratory and School of Oceanography at the University of Washington.

At the time, Seatrec had recently launched its commercial infiniTE™ float. In their discussions, Altabet and D’Asaro explored how the infiniTE float could fundamentally alter sampling strategies for turbulence, internal waves, and ocean mixing, marking the beginning of a co-development effort.

Chao explained, “Data below the ocean surface is significantly lacking because traditional profiling floats are all powered by primary batteries that limit float life and data collection capability. The infiniTE float harvests energy from temperature gradients in the ocean and can therefore collect more frequent measurements and carry new sensors.”

The collaboration led to the successful development and deployment of an infiniTE float equipped with two sensors to measure oxygen and Total Dissolved Gas Pressure (TDGP), key indicators of ecosystem health, environmental stress, and carbon cycling. Accurate TDGP measurement requires the float to park at multiple depths and remain at each level long enough for the sensor to obtain reliable readings.

D’Asaro commented, “This type of mission has never been done before with the existing float products. The infiniTE float changes the way we think about power in a profiling float. In a battery-powered float, the total energy is fixed, so you try to minimize power usage by minimizing the number of profiles. Since the infiniTE float recharges its battery with the energy harvested from the ocean, there is no power penalty for more profiles.”

Altabet added, “Looking into the future, the infiniTE float can be used to profile more rapidly to resolve the diurnal variation of oxygen and its impact on productivity. This could only be done with the infiniTE float in a sustained way.”

The mission expands on Seatrec’s broader efforts to develop long-duration autonomous ocean systems, including a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA) with the Naval Postgraduate School focused on supporting persistent, real-time oceanographic and acoustic measurements in open-ocean environments.

Related to this work, Chao will present at this week’s AGU Ocean Sciences Meeting in Glasgow, Scotland, on harvesting energy from ocean temperature gradients to power underwater robots and sensors for persistent monitoring.