Louis Whitcomb, Professor, Mechanical Engineering
“If I'm told, ‘you can't put your finger there’ or ‘it is inaccessible,’ that's where I want to go. When we are remote-controlling a robot vehicle six kilometers deep on the ocean floor, or precisely probing the depths of the human ear, our robots enable us to be there. In the zone. It’s very exciting.”
The HROV is scheduled to become operational in 2007 and will be used both autonomously and via a fiber-optic communications tether to explore the Marianas Trench.