Florida Atlantic University Wins $1M AUKUS Grant to Develop Hybrid Acoustic-Optical Underwater Communication System

Florida Atlantic University has been awarded a US$1 million grant through the AUKUS Maritime Innovation Challenge to develop a next-generation underwater communication and networking system that combines long-range acoustic links with high-speed visible-light optical technology. The project, led by FAU's Center for Connected Autonomy and Artificial Intelligence in collaboration with Swiss optical specialist Hydromea, was selected from a highly competitive pool of proposals submitted by universities, research institutions, and industry across all three AUKUS nations, and will be demonstrated in field trials off the coast of Australia involving autonomous surface vessels, underwater vehicles, and stationary seabed systems.

 

The Underwater Communication Problem and the Hybrid Solution

 

Underwater communication remains one of the most significant technical constraints on autonomous maritime operations. Conventional wireless technologies including radio waves and GPS do not propagate through seawater, forcing operators to rely on acoustic or optical communication systems, each of which carries fundamental limitations. Acoustic signals can travel long distances through water but offer limited bandwidth, restricting the volume and speed of data that can be shared. Optical communication using visible light transmits data at high speed but only over short distances, limiting its utility for vehicles or sensors that are not in close proximity. The FAU and Hydromea solution integrates both modalities into a single programmable platform, using long-range acoustic links for resilient command and control communications while deploying high-speed visible-light links for rapid data sharing among nearby autonomous vehicles and sensors. The system is designed to adapt dynamically to changing underwater conditions and to maintain connectivity in congested or contested operational environments, which is a critical requirement for defence applications.

 

AUKUS Context and Strategic Rationale

 

The grant was awarded through the AUKUS Maritime Innovation Challenge, a trilateral defence innovation initiative supported by Australia's Advanced Strategic Capabilities Accelerator, the United Kingdom's Defence and Security Accelerator, and the United States Defense Innovation Unit. The selection of the FAU and Hydromea proposal from a field spanning the three allied nations reflects the strategic priority that AUKUS partners place on developing autonomous underwater capability and the communications infrastructure needed to realise it. Persistent, reliable underwater communication is foundational to the deployment of autonomous underwater vehicle fleets for surveillance, mine countermeasures, infrastructure protection, and other defence applications that have become central to the maritime strategies of all three nations. Principal investigator George Sklivanitis of FAU's CA-AI centre has framed the current state of underwater communications as forcing operators to choose between range and speed, a trade-off that the hybrid system is specifically designed to resolve.

 

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Research Programme and Demonstration Pathway

 

Over the 12-month grant period, the team will conduct controlled testing at Hydromea's facilities in Switzerland and at FAU's SeaTech campus in Dania Beach, Florida, before progressing to increasingly sophisticated field demonstrations off the coast of Australia. The Australian demonstration environment is particularly relevant because it provides realistic open-ocean conditions for validating the system's performance across the full range of operational scenarios, including multi-vehicle coordination between autonomous surface vessels, underwater vehicles, and stationary seabed sensors. The structured escalation from controlled laboratory testing to field demonstration reflects a disciplined validation approach that is appropriate for technology intended for deployment in defence-critical applications where reliability is non-negotiable.

 

Broader Applications and Long-Term Significance

 

Beyond the immediate defence context, the FAU and Hydromea communication system has significant potential across scientific research, environmental monitoring, and offshore industrial applications. Persistent ocean monitoring programmes, offshore wind and oil and gas infrastructure inspection, and distributed sensor networks for climate and biodiversity observation all depend on reliable underwater data sharing, and the ability to combine long-range acoustic connectivity with high-speed optical links in a single adaptable platform addresses a capability gap that spans multiple sectors. FAU College of Engineering and Computer Science dean Stella Batalama has described the technology's potential to help fleets of autonomous underwater vehicles coordinate more effectively, support persistent ocean monitoring, improve situational awareness, and enable faster sharing of subsurface data. The project builds on ongoing National Science Foundation-funded work by FAU's CA-AI on networked swarms of autonomous underwater vehicles, providing a strong technical foundation from which the AUKUS grant work can accelerate toward operational deployment readiness for allied maritime forces.