MORUS

Project name: Unmanned system for maritime security and environmental monitoring
Project acronym: MORUS
Dates: 01.04.2015 - 28.02.2019
Total budget: 834,929.00 EUR
Funding: NATO Science for Peace
Grant Agreement number: 984807
website: www.fer.unizg.hr/morus


The main goal of the MORUS project is the design and development of a fully operational complex robotic system prototype comprised of an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) and an Unmanned Underwater Vehicle (UUV) capable of autonomous and cooperative mission executions related to environmental, border and port security.

The proposed research is part of an internationally competitive field, with the main objective to design and develop an autonomous aerial and marine robotic system which is capable of collective engagement in missions taking place in dynamic and nondeterministic environments.

MORUS objectives are summarised as follows:

  • Design and construction of an UAV with docking and transportation mechanisms,
  • Visual-feedback-based docking and gripping algorithm,
  • Design of an augmented-reality and easy to operate human-machine interface for simultaneous control of aerial and marine robots,
  • Enhancement of the autonomous navigation capabilities and operational supportability in remote locations with little or no local support,
  • Agile UUV redeployment through cooperation with an UAV,
  • Data exchange between the UUV and UAV through cooperative control and estimation.

 

 

 

Project partners:

  1. Laboratory for Robotics and Intelligent Control Systems, University of Zagreb, Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing
  2. University of Limerick
  3. University of Sarajevo, Faculty of Electrical Engineering
  4. Laboratory for Underwater Systems and Technologies, University of Zagreb, Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing
  5. University of Dubrovnik

 

 


News

Lovro Marković presented his paper at...

Within NATO SfP project MORUS and EU project AeRoTwin, Lovro Marković and Marko Car attended the European Control Conference from 25th to 28th of June, 2019 in Naples, Italy. At the conference Lovro presented their paper titled Geometric Tracking Control of Aerial Robots Based on Centroid Vectoring.

Their paper focuses on presenting the concept of geometric tracking control for an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) based on variations in centerof gravity (CoG). The proposed UAV model has the ability to exploit its dynamic CoG as a means of stabilization and control. A mathematical model of such a system is used as a base for developing the nonlinear geometric tracking controller on the special Euclidean group SE(3). Finally, two unique UAV models, presented with a trajectory tracking problem, are simulated in a realistic simulation environment. Performance of the selected control terms is analyzed based on relevant simulation results.

Author: Ivana Mikolić
Rijeka Nautic Show

It's been a very active time for our Lab, as our Lab members went to Rijeka, Croatia, from 28th to 30th September 2018,  to present our work and our particularly equipment at the Rijeka Nautic Show as part of our new AeRoTwin project. Three of our colleagues were there, prof. Stjepan Bogdan, Marko Car and Lovro Marković, and they presented the UAV designed during the MORUS project.

Author: Alan Vukić
LARICS' paper presented at IFAC...

Our Marsela Polić was at the 11th IFAC Conference on Control Applications in Marine Systems, Robotics, and Vehicles - CAMS, in Opatija, Croatia, 10th-12th September. There she presented a paper entitled "Compliant net for AUV retrieval using an UAV", which was co-authored by Antun Ivanović, Marsela Polić, Omar Salah, Matko Orsag, and Stjepan Bogdan. The research for the paper was done as part of the MORUS project, funded by NATO's Emerging Security Challenges Division in the framework of the Science for Peace and Security Programme.

Author: Alan Vukić
MORUS experiments in Udbina

The LARICS part of the MORUS team spent a week in a military base in Udbina preparing the MORUS aerial vehicle its first take off. Stjepan Bogdan, Matko Orsag, Tomislav Haus, Antun Ivanović, Marko Car were preparing the aerial vehicle powered by four internal combustion engines for its first flight.

Author: Alan Vukić
EUROC and MORUS presented on DRONEfest

LARICS participated in DRONEfest 2017, presenting our recent results in collaborative projects EUROC and MORUS. The presentation included both a live demo of wind turbine inspection, the work completed under EUROC project, as well as a display of the MORUS UAV. Matko Orsag gave a talk titled “Heterogeneous robotic systems for inspection and interaction with the environment”.

Author: Alan Vukić
MORUS 2nd Workshop and General...

Project MORUS 2nd Workshop and General Assembly were held at FER from February 2nd to 10th 2017. All partners in the project participated in the preparation and execution of this workshop. The goal of the MORUS project 2nd workshop was twofold: first, UAV roll and pitch control loops, implementing a moving mass concept, were tested, together with the low-level state machine. Second, the integration of the Human Machine Interface with a high-level state machine and overall system communication have been done.

Author: Alan Vukić
LARICS at BTS2016

LARICS researchers participated in interdisciplinary field workshop on maritime robotics and applications - Breaking the Surface 2016 in Biograd na Moru, Croatia. Prof. Stjepan Bogdan gave an invited lecture titled “Unmanned system for maritime security and environmental monitoring“. As a part of demonstrations, LARICS researchers participated in a presentation of two projects – subCULTron (dr.sc. Tamara Petrović and Barbara Arbanas) and MORUS (dr.sc. Matko Orsag and Tomislav Haus). Both presentations were well attended and researchers from all over the world expressed interest in hardware and software developed in LARICS.

Author: Alan Vukić
MORUS internal Workshop

MORUS project internal workshop was held from 20th to 24th June 2016 at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing. The main purpose of the workshop was transferring knowledge among project partners, as well as integrating developed software modules, particularly the system state machine, models for the Gazebo simulator and communication modules. On Thursday, 23rd of June, the project partners visited lake Jarun, where the LABUST team demonstrated unmanned underwater vehicle behavior in the real world conditions.

Author: Alan Vukić
LARICS is partner in MORUS – NATO SfP...

NATO Science for Peace project “MORUS – Unmanned systems for maritime security and environmental monitoring” starts in 2015. The project's duration is 36 months and the partners are UNIZG-FER (LARICS and LABUST), University of Limerick (Marine Robotics Research Centre), University of Sarajevo (Faculty of Electrical Engineering) and University of Dubrovnik. The main goal of the MORUS project is to design and produce a prototype of a fully operational robotic system comprised of an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) and an Unmanned Underwater Vehicle (UUV).

Author: Alan Vukić