Yellow Submarine Probes Undersea World

July 14, 2008 -- Far out in the Atlantic, a little yellow submarine is trying to slip from current to current, gliding across the ocean beneath the waves.

The unmanned sub is nearing the halfway mark in its effort to travel from New Jersey to Spain, collecting scientific data along the way.

It isn't a first trip for the device, but it will be the longest, a proving effort to show that an undersea glider can take its place in a global ocean observing system.

"The big advantage is, it's totally unmanned," explained Conrad Lautenbacher, head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, a sponsor of the sub developed and operated by Rutgers University. "It's very efficient and can be used to obtain the same kind of data we gather from ships."

"It can be done totally remotely," added Lautenbacher. "It can be controlled from a rec room in Ohio if necessary."

Like a glider airplane, the sub doesn't have a motor to drive it. Dubbed "Scarlet Knight" after the school mascot -- never mind its color -- the sub uses wings to fly through the water as it dives and rises, seeking currents that will carry it where the researchers want it to go, explained Scott Glenn, a marine sciences professor at Rutgers.

Instead of looking for thermals of rising air, however, the undersea glider sucks water in to dive and then pushes it out again to rise, spending most of its time between 15 feet and 300 feet deep. It's crammed with batteries, and one thing Glenn hopes to learn is just how long they will last.

At the surface, it sends data to a satellite and can be controlled remotely, operating a rudder or shifting the position of its batteries from side to side.

On this trip, the glider is focusing on the temperature and salinity of the ocean, Glenn said in a telephone interview, but all sorts of sensors can be attached to make various scientific measurements.

The actual operation and monitoring is being done by Rutgers students in the COOL room, formally known as the Coastal Ocean Observation Laboratory.