Biohybrid Robots Based on Jellyfish Designed to Gather Climate Science Data From Depths of the Oceans

Jellyfish are simple creatures that cannot do much besides eating, swimming, breeding, and stinging. They also lack brains, blood, or even hearts, yet these marine organisms can easily travel to the depths of the oceans in a way that humans cannot.

Gathering Climate Science Data

A vast majority of the Earth's oceans remain unexplored. One of the limiting factors is the vertical range and measurement duration of existing robotic platforms. Since the impacts of climate change on the physics and biogeochemistry of the ocean have been accelerating, there is a need for new tools that can measure more of the sea on faster timescales.

Various robotic technologies for ocean exploration have resulted in advances in ocean science. For instance, remote sensing platforms like uncrewed aerial vehicles and satellites have created high-resolution maps of sensitive marine habitats. These were also used in studying critical physical characteristics of the ocean, like salinity and temperature.

However, these technologies are limited in the achievable depth of observations by solar illumination and water turbidity. Deep sea tools like autonomous underwater vehicles can explore significant depths, but the duration of their mission is often limited by battery capacity.

Biohybrid Jellyfish for Ocean Exploration

What if jellyfish can be sent to explore the oceans on our behalf, reporting whatever they find? California Institute of Technology (Caltech) experts aim to make it a reality by creating a biohybrid robotic jellyfish. The study, entitled "Electromechanical enhancement of live jellyfish for ocean exploration," was conducted in the laboratory of John Dabiri and builds on his previous work augmenting jellyfish.

In his earlier research, Dabiri implanted jellyfish with an electronic pacemaker that controls their swim speed. Using this mechanism, the researchers found that if jellyfish were made to swim faster than the leisurely pace they normally keep, then these creatures could become even more efficient. A jellyfish that swims three times faster than it typically uses only twice as much energy.

This time, Dabiri and his colleagues went a step further by adding a forebody to the jellyfish. These forebodies serve as hats that sit atop the creature's bell. The devices were made by lead author Simon Anuszczyk, who wanted to make the jellyfish more streamlined while providing a place to carry sensors and other electronics.

According to Anuszczyk, the forebodies were designed to reduce drag and increase the animal's swimming performance. At the same time, his team also experimented with 3D printing until they could carefully balance the buoyancy and keep the creature swimming vertically.

Dabiri's laboratory constructed a massive vertical aquarium inside Caltech's Guggenheim Laboratory to test the jellyfish's augmented swimming abilities. The three-story tank was made to be tall rather than wide because the scientists wanted to gather data on oceanic conditions below the surface.

Swim tests on the tank revealed that a biohybrid jellyfish equipped with a swimming pacemaker and forebody can swim up to 4.5 times faster than an all-natural jellyfish while carrying a payload. Since the total cost is only $20 per jellyfish, the robots can be an attractive alternative to renting a research vessel that can cost over $50,000 a day to run.

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