Air-Water Communication and Sensing with Light

Abstract

The ability to communicate and sense across the air-water boundary is essential for efficient exploration and monitoring of the underwater world. Existing wireless solutions for communication and sensing typically focus on a single physical medium and fall short in achieving high-bandwidth communication and accurate sensing across the air-water interface without any relays on the water surface. We study the use of laser light in this context given its ability to effectively pass the air-water boundary. We present a holistic system framework to address practical challenges such as ambient light interference and environmental dynamics. The proposed AmphiLight framework achieves 5 Mbps bi-directional throughput and zero bit error rate with ranges up to 6.1 m in strong ambient light conditions, and connection time improvements between 47.1 % and 29.5% during wave dynamics. Our ongoing effort extends to realizing robust air-water sensing that enables aerial drones to track multiple underwater robots for topology planning and coordination.