This article was taken from the May 2015 issue of WIRED magazine. Be the first to read WIRED's articles in print before they're posted online, and get your hands on loads of additional content by subscribing online.
The problem with toxins in the ocean is that they get everywhere and are expensive to clean up far from land. French-Japanese engineer Cesar Harada may have a solution: shape-shifting sail-bots that can navigate the ocean, dragging, for example, oil-absorbing sponges. "I started working on this in 2010 in New Orleans, trying to develop robots to clean up the Deepwater Horizon oil spill," Harada says. "The Protei boats can change shape to alter trajectory, like a fish, so they’re more energy-efficient."
In December, Harada, who is also a TED Fellow, used them to measure radioactive contamination of seawater and the ocean floor following the Fukushima nuclear disaster. Sail-bots carrying underwater Geiger counters measured radioactive particles in the ocean at 33 locations along the Japanese coast. The sail-bots are currently radio-controlled and must stay in sight of shore, but Harada is working to make them fully autonomous using Android smartphones. "We really know only five per cent of the ocean -- less than we know about the Moon," he says.
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
