SWiM3: Submersible, Wireless Marine Mammal Monitor

The US Navy uses bottlenose dolphins in the fleet’s operational Marine Mammal Systems to protect harbors, detect mines, and locate/recover hardware. To maintain fitness of these animals, Navy vets use monitoring, such as ECG, to assess cardiac health. However, current technologies limit use to dock-side treatment, potentially confounding or hiding cardiac issues. Thus, there is a need for a wearable, wireless ECG unit to monitor cardiac rate and rhythm while the animal is at rest and swimming. To address this need, Luna Innovations, marine mammal vets, and ML/AI experts at Elder Research propose development of SWiM3: Submersible, Wireless Marine Mammal Monitor. This low-power, extended monitoring, wireless sensor system will be ruggedized for the marine environment, but hydrodynamic and low-profile for dolphin safety and comfort. The electronics are developed from a range of Luna’s current monitoring systems that couple ruggedization from armament monitoring with physiologic sensing and safety from newborn wearables – ensuring a successful, effective device for marine mammals.